


Begin Again

by CuriousCarson



Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, Artist Steve Rogers, Asexual Character, Asexual Natasha Romanov, Bisexual Female Character, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexual Peggy Carter, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Break Up, Childhood Friends, Christmas, Deaf Clint Barton, Depression, Discussion of Abortion, F/F, F/M, Feminist Steve Rogers, First Kiss, First Love, First Time, Fondue, Friends to Lovers, Halloween, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, Loss of Limbs, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Mentions of Cancer, Miscarriage, Mistletoe, POV Alternating, Post-Break Up, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Sexism, Thanksgiving, Time Skips, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-24
Updated: 2018-06-24
Packaged: 2019-05-20 18:19:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 45,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14899584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CuriousCarson/pseuds/CuriousCarson
Summary: In 2015, Steve Rogers spends a year studying abroad in London, where he meets Peggy Carter. She's whip-smart, and can lay out a grown man with a single punch, and Steve can't believe a woman like that exists, much less that she'd be interested in him.In 2016, Steve learns his best friend since childhood Bucky Barnes has been medically discharged after narrowly surviving an IED explosion somewhere near Raqqa.In 2017, MI6 stations Peggy Carter in New York City on her where she meets Angie Martinelli, an aspiring actress who works at the 24/7 cafe down the block from her apartment.A story of falling in love, falling out of love, and falling in love again.





	1. September 14, 2015 & September 14, 2016

_** 14 September 2015 ** _

 

“Do you have a favorite painting, Steven? A favorite book? A favorite movie?” Dr. Erskine asks. 

“Yes,” Steve says hesitantly.

“These works, they move you, yes? They make you happy? Make you want to change something about your life?” 

“Yes, but-“

Erskine doesn’t let him interject. “There were schools looking for art teachers at the fair. I hope you’re not telling me that teaching is a meaningless profession. If so, I’m sad to hear I’ve wasted the last two decades of my life.” 

“I didn’t mean it like,” Steve says. “I didn't mean you.”

 

Every spring the art department puts on a career fair, inviting employers from every industry that hired art majors. It was all to give the students an opportunity to showcase their projects and to “network.”

Networking, as far as Steve could tell, was a bullshit term for making small talk and exchanging business cards in a pathetic attempt to convince the people with the power to hire you that you were worth a damn.

Even though he was only a sophomore, Steve had attended the fair at his professor’s encouragement.  ( _“I’ve been bragging about you Steven, you better be there.”_ )

So he put up displays of some of his best work (The portrait of his mother that hung in the student gallery for a few months, photos of the mural he did for the old rec center, the comics he made for his first-year portfolio). He smiled and shook hands and accepted business cards. And he left as soon as he could.  

He lugged his displays back to his apartment, and, slamming the door behind him, he collapsed face first into their sofa. It reeked of cigarette smoke, because that was what you got for twenty bucks on Craigslist. It was going to kick up his asthma if he kept laying there, but he couldn’t summon the will to move.  

“Rough day, partner?” his roommate asked in a sarcastic drawl. 

“Networking sucks,” Steve said into the cushions. “Being an adult sucks.” Without moving his body, Steve turned his head to see Nat perched on the kitchen counter. She always managed to make adulting look easy. One of these days he would have to ask her how she did it. 

She studied him for a beat, probably debating if she wanted to ask more or let him mope in peace. She decides to shrug, dismount the counter, and tell him rehearsal would run late that night, so don’t wait up her.

He waited up for her anyway. He liked to make sure she got home safe, and he had enough thinking to keep him up all night anyway. 

 

The next day he marched straight to Dr. Erskine's office and told his advisor he was thinking about changing his major.

He couldn’t explain the sudden change of heart. It wasn’t that he no longer enjoyed studying art. He loved it. He could spend hours losing himself in a painting.  If it weren’t for Sam, who would show up at the studio with Chinese take-out whenever he had been there too long, he would work until he fainted.  

Whenever he sat still for too long his fingers itched for a pencil and some paper. Or a napkin. Or a newspaper. He’s tried not to sketch in the corners of books since he was banned from the college library.  

(Wanda had laughed her ass off when she heard this was actually his second time getting banned from a library. Because when he was eleven he had seen a group of eighth graders push a seven-year-old off the computer she was using, and it turns out the Brooklyn Heights Public Library frowns upon starting fist fights). 

So it wasn’t that he no longer loved art.  He even enjoyed the boring stuff: the history, the technique, all the stuff the other students complained about. 

When the high school counselors and friends of his mom tried to talk him out of majoring in art, Steve dug his heels in. He almost told a few of them to go fuck themselves. But most of his mom’s friends were from church, and he didn’t need to make things any harder for her. 

If the stack of business cards on his desk was anything to go by, he wouldn't be stuck working as a barista for the rest of his life. Everyone wanted to hire him. To be a  graphic designer, illustrator, teacher, curator, animator, photographers, even an architect. But none of it felt right. 

Steve stood there listening to marketers and publishers and video game studios make their elevator pitch, and he couldn’t shake the profound feeling that he should be doing something more with his life.

 

“Do you know what that something is?” Dr. Erskine asks. Steve shakes his head. Erskine tuts and offers him tea.

Erskine was easily Steve’s favorite professor.  He’s overheard other students complain about his unconventional teaching style or heavy German accent, but those students, frankly, were idiots as far as Steve was concerned. How could they miss his self-deprecating wit? How could they not enjoy his anecdote-peppered lectures?

If anyone can help Steve reign in the ugly doubt that reared its head at the career fair, it was Erskine.

But then Erskine comes to Steve with the last suggestion he could have imagined: a year abroad. 

“I cannot begin to explain how my life improved when I moved to America,” Erskine had explained. “My entire world-view changed. Not only did I see America more clearly, I saw my home country more clearly too. And I saw myself more clearly, and I became a better man because of it.”

Steve had protested that he couldn’t afford it, he wouldn’t be able to graduate in four years, couldn’t get into a program so last minute.

But Erskine had never steered him wrong before.  From the first day of their first class together, Erskine had recognized something in Steve, and because of it, pushed him harder than any of his other students.

  

Which was how Steve ended up sitting in a classroom in London, trying to explain all of this to the pretty girl that sat beside him. She was probably expecting him to say something about wanting to see Big Ben, not hear his life story.

 

Steve did his research and went back to Erskine with a program in London. _Trading one big city for another,_ he thought. At least he would speak the language, because his high school French wasn’t going to get him far.  Erskine helped him with the paperwork and before he knew it, Steve was saying goodbye to his mom, his roommates, his friends. 

His flight had been delayed five hours, and his mother was up all night worrying. It was only his third time on an airplane. Between hospital bills and New York cost of living, they’d never had a lot of money to spare on vacations. But one year the Barnes had visited the Grand Canyon, and Bucky and Becca each got to bring a friend. So Steve knew to expect the strange swoop in his stomach that meant the wheels had left the tarmac.

It was raining in London when he arrived. He supposed that was to be expected.

The whole city seemed to be in greyscale. Slate-colored buildings, cloudy skies, black and white suits. With pops of red to break up the monotone. A post box. A telephone booth. A double-decker bus. He felt a familiar twitch in his fingers and knew his sketchbook would be the first thing he’d unpack.

The study abroad department had arranged housing for him, a dorm-style hall with other exchange students. There was Gabe Jones, from Georgia, linguistics major on his right. Jim Mortia, from California, engineering major on his left. Across the hall was Jacques Dernier, from France, in London to improve his English.  

The four of them had gone out that night to celebrate. Steve wouldn’t be 21 until next July, so it was his first time drinking in public. He felt like he tricked the system. The bartender hadn’t even asked to see his ID, which, given his small frame, seemed like a reason to celebrate. 

 

A little bit jet-lagged, a little bit hungover, he’s sitting in his first class of the semester. Life Drawing, so instead of desks, there are easels arranged in a circle around the middle of the room. He arrived early to grab a good spot, but by now nearly all the easels have someone sitting behind them. A few students are chatting with each other, but most are scrolling through their phones.

“Is anyone sitting here?” 

Steve turns to see a woman pointing to the spot on his right. She has red hair, somewhere between Natasha’s auburn and Pepper’s strawberry blonde, he thinks, but curlier. And unlike the tight buns Natasha wore to rehearsal, this woman’s hair was haphazardly piled on top of her head, held in place by a pencil. She’s wearing a pink and green dress, and it’s the most colorful ensemble he’s seen on a Londoner yet. Her smile is also one of friendliest. 

“Feel free to take it,” Steve says, doing his best to return the warm smile. 

Rather than sitting right away, she extends her hand toward Steve, “I’m Ana.”

“Steve. Steve Rogers,” he says shaking her hand. 

“An exchange student?” she asks, “What brings you to London?” And Steve does his best to summarize the art fair/ Erskine/ now he has a British Visa situation. 

Her accent isn’t quite English. She tells him that she’s Hungarian, but she’s a full-time student here.  Scrambling for something interesting to say, he adds, “I hear Hungary is beautiful.” 

It wasn’t really a lie. Natasha had visited Budapest at some point. He wasn’t sure when, or what she was doing there, but she had mentioned it once.

“Oh, it is,” Ana’s face lights up. “You have to visit while you’re in Europe.” She puts her hand on his arm and leans toward him like she’s sharing a secret. “I can help you find cheap tickets for a flight. I visit as often as I can, so I know all the tricks,” she adds with a wink. 

If Steve could will himself not to blush he would. Instead, he stammers, “What made you want to study in England?”

“My husband is English,” she says. “Well, he was not yet my husband when I decided to apply. Actually, I had only known him for a month. His father’s job took him to Budapest, and the family came to stay with him for the summer.” 

A sweet smile passes over her face as she talks about it, and Steve feels absurdly guilty for interpreting her behavior, even momentarily, as flirting. Her eyes snap back to focus, and she looked almost self-conscious as she says, “You are thinking that sounds crazy, that we are too young to  be married, but it did not take long for us to see we had something special .”

“I think it sounds real romantic,” Steve says earnestly. 

Ana nudges him in the side. “What about you? Anybody special?”

Steve lets out a bitter laugh. He was perpetually single, hadn’t been on a date since high school, and hadn’t been in a relationship _ever_.

“No?” Ana scrutinizes him for a moment, staring him up and down, and he’s definitely blushing now. “Well, you never know,” she says. “Well, love often finds you when you least expect it.  Maybe you'll meet someone while you're here.”

  

* * *

 

_** 14 September 2016 ** _

 

Steve must be doomed to have rotten luck at airports. His first time on a plane he jumped so hard when the plane took off, he’d spilled water all over himself. The rest of the flight he’d been wet and cold and miserable.  And when they got to Arizona, the airport had lost his luggage, so he had to spend the whole vacation borrowing Bucky’s clothes. At age fourteen Bucky was already two sizes bigger, so Steve spent most of the vacation rolling up his sleeves and tightening his belt. The whole family wouldn’t stop teasing him about it.

 

 _“You two really do_ _share everything,” Winnie had said with a chuckle_.   

_ Rebecca nudged her brother in the side, “Are you gonna ask your boyfriend for your jacket back or are you gonna let him keep it ?” _

_ “Shut up!” Bucky said, shoving her harder. _

 

The second time, going to London, his plane had been delayed five hours. And on the way home from London, he’d broke down crying. Some poor flight attendant had to bring him tissues. 

He wasn’t on an airplane now, but he was at an airport. And the flight he’s waiting on has already been delayed twice. He’s missing class, but senioritis must be real because he can’t bring himself to give a damn. He’ll get the notes from the girl who sits next to him. 

A man coming down the escalator catches his eye, and Steve has to will his heart down to its proper place in his chest. 

_It’s not him._

The man in the suit sets down his suitcase and struts toward the rental car garage, never taking his eyes off of his smartphone.

_Of course it’s not,_ Steve thinks. _His plane hasn’t even landed yet._

But the man had brown hair and broad shoulders and from a distance looked like Bucky. A little bit. Or maybe Steve was a little anxious. 

He rolls his shoulders and stretches his neck. He’s starting to ache from sitting on the metal benches they’ve got in the terminal.  He considers getting up, stretching his legs, maybe buying a coffee, but he doesn't want to stray too far from the arrivals board. He keeps checking it. Every thirty seconds or so. It hasn’t changed. 

The businessman probably didn’t even look that much like Bucky _._ Steve was wearing his old glasses with the outdated prescription.  A stupid decision in hindsight, but he’d been in the studio until four a.m. because he couldn’t sleep, and he wasn’t about to put his contacts back in.

And these were the glasses he’d worn in high school. 

_It’s not like he wouldn’t recognize you in different glasses,_ Steve’s brain provides helpfully. He looked better in the new pair. These made him look like the annoying kid from The Polar Express. 

Steve refreshes the webpage pulled up on his phone. In case it’s updated before the arrivals board.

It wasn’t.

He does have a new WhatsApp message. His eyes flicker to the arrivals board again, just to check, before he clicks on the green icon. 

_ I’ll be thinking of you today. <3 _

Peggy remembered. 

_Of course she did._ How many times had she listened to him ramble about his best friend?  Even if they hadn’t been talking as much lately, she was the first person he’d told when he got the call that Bucky was going to be discharged. He’d felt a little guilty about it, like he was bragging. But Peggy hadn’t seemed jealous or hurt, only happy for him. 

He’d been so certain when he got the call from Mrs. Barnes it would be bad news on the other end. 

He supposed from a certain perspective it was. There had been an I.E.D., somewhere near Raqqa. Severe trauma to his left arm, an amputation would be necessary. 

But it wasn’t the worst possible news, the unimaginable news.

“He only had two months left on his tour.” That’s what his mom kept repeating, as if that somehow made it worse. “ Just two months.”

Steve had wanted to shout at her, to say that he didn’t care if he was coming home in two months or ten, with three limbs or none at all, so long as he was coming home. But he had saved that for when he was talking to Peggy. So he listened to Winnie, thanked her for letting him know.

“Of course, Steven. You’re as much his family as we are,” she had said without hesitation. “That reminds me.  I think he’ll want to move back to New York. He’ll visit us of course, but he’s a city boy at heart. He  was bored out of his mind when he was here last time.”

George and Winnie moved to Indiana after Bucky graduated high school. There were too many memories in New York, George said. They had relatives near Indianapolis. Bucky had visited them during his one an only leave. It’s been over three years since he’d been in New York.

Steve had never even been to Indiana.

“If you could help him get settled?” Winnie had asked, so earnestly.

And it had been Steve’s turn to say “Of course.” Steve would do anything for Bucky. The Barnes had to know that. 

Steve’s eyes return the arrivals board. _Flight TK 616 arriving in gate 1A_. It's like a shot of adrenaline to his heart.  _Jeez, Rogers. Calm down._ The last thing he needs is to send himself into an asthma attack. 

If the flight is just arriving, he still has to go through customs, right? Steve has time to get his shit together.

He pulls out his phone and sends a message to Peggy. _His flight_ _just arrived_ _. Wish me luck._

She replies in an instant. _You don’t need it. You’ll be fine._

Steve stands up now, walks over to the escalator that all the arrivals have been coming down. But then he feels sort of dumb just standing there so he goes back to the bench. He wonders if he should have made a welcome home sign. There’d been a family here earlier that had done that for their mom. 

The next few minutes creep by. He pulls out his phone a few times, but he’s not sure what he’s checking for. Then finally, _finally,_ he sees people at the top of the escalator. His eyes scan the crowd before they catch a glimpse of army fatigues.  Around Steve, people scatter to the baggage claim, the taxis, the customer service desk, but he only sees Bucky.

Sometimes, when he’s sitting in his apartment, reading or sketching or just messing around on his computer, the room will suddenly go bright.  He doesn't even realize the sun had gone behind a cloud until it returns, washing the room with warm light, making the colors more vivid, casting strange shadows on the floor. 

That’s what it’s like seeing him again. 

His eyes find Steve’s from the top of the escalator, and his face breaks into a huge grin. He’s rougher around the edges than the last time Steve saw him. Hair a little longer than he should it be in uniform, and he hasn’t shaved in a day or two. Steve guesses they cut him some slack at the hospital.

“Steve?” he says, stepping off the elevator, like its a question. Like he can’t believe it either. 

“Hey Buck,” Steve says pulling him into a hug, “How ya been?”

Steve feels the old familiar weight of Bucky’s arm on his shoulders, pulling him closer. It’s a little strange, Steve thinks, this three-armed hug. 

Because that’s the other change, the big one. Where Bucky’s left arm should be is nothing. An empty sleeve. It ends somewhere just below his shoulder.  Steve compensates by hugging him even tighter. 

“Not bad, all things considered.”  Bucky pulls away but leaves his arm resting on Steve’s shoulders. Steve uses the moment to study him. Up close, Steve can see circles under his eyes. “You look different. Are you taller?” Bucky asks.

Steve is, actually, a few inches taller than when Bucky saw him last. He had one last growth spurt his freshman year. He’s put on a little weight too, since he's found an asthma medication that allowed him to work out. But, after three years, Steve’s surprised _that’s_ the thing he comments on.

Steve lets the corners of his mouth quirk up. “I think you  just forgot what I look liked.”

Bucky laughs sharply. “Well, I see you’re not any less of a punk.” And Steve has to laugh a little too.  “Fuck,” Bucky mummers and pulls him into another quick hug, before heaving his bag up onto his shoulders and heading toward the exit. “It’s good to be back.”

“Your parents are sorry they couldn’t be here,” Steve says. “But I’m sure they’ve already told you that. I know you’re gonna go visit them soon, but you gotta stop by my mom’s place before you go. She bought the stuff to make all your favorite foods. Potato casserole, brisket, chocolate cake.”

“Stevie, you gotta stop or I’m gonna start drooling. I’m fucking starving,” he nudges Steve in the side. “Tell your mom I’m gonna stop by soon, but I’ve been dreaming of Dorothea’s for three goddamn years now. I mean, I’ve had fantasies about this pizza.”

“I don’t need to know the details,” Steve says, and it’s so achingly familiar. Bucky cursing up a storm, saying indecent things just to try and get Steve to blush. “We can pick up a pizza and take it back to the apartment.”

“About that Steve, I can get a hotel or something-” Bucky starts to say. 

“Don’t give me that,” Steve cuts him off. “You’re not getting a hotel when I’ve got an extra bedroom in my apartment. It may be a glorified closet, but it’s yours as long as you want it. Wanda decided to move in with her boyfriend, so you’re really doing us a favor. Roommate hunting is brutal.”

“It’ll justbe until the spring semester starts,” Bucky says. “The VA’s supposed to cover a housing stipend. Sooner if I can find a place cheap enough.”

“I’m telling you, Buck, you don’t have to. I talked it all over with Nat, and she’s excited to meet you. It’s in a great neighborhood. And if you get sick of us, Mom says she be happy to have you back under her roof.” 

Bucky gives him a long-suffering look.  The kind he would give Steve when he knew he was about to get dragged into a fight because Steve was too stubborn to back down. “I don’t want to impose.”

“It’s not an imposition. You’d do the same for me.” 

 

* * *

 

Dorothea’s is a tiny hole in the wall near the Barnes’s old apartment. The kind of place you’d walk by if you didn’t know to look for it. The same Italian family has owned it for generations. Bucky swore they made the best pizza in New York, and Steve was inclined to agree. 

Their pizza was the taste of Steve’s childhood. His mom loved to cook, so they rarely ate out, but whenever he slept over at Bucky’s there was Dorothea’s.  They’d make a fort out of blankets and couch cushions and watch hours of cartoons, stuffing their faces with cheese and pepperoni.

From the train to the subway to the walk to the restaurant, Steve can't stop talking. He points out changes to the neighborhood, and Bucky asks about their friends from high school. A guy who was in their Biology class just got engaged, according to Facebook, and it seems unreal to Steve, that so many people their age are married. 

Bucky exhales heavily, “Sounds like I’ve missed a lot.”

It hits Steve over and over again. The sound of Bucky’s rough laugh, the feel of his elbow nudging him as he tells a joke. Even the smell of him a reminder that _he’s here._ They’re together again, just like old times. It feels unreal and so, _so right_  all at once.

The smell of cheese and grease hits them as soon as they open the door. It’s still early for dinner, so the place is empty when they get there. The girl behind the counter is on her phone, but she drops it when the bell over the door rings. 

“Sorry,” she says. “What can I get you?” 

Steve orders their usual and hands over a few crumpled bills. Bucky gives him a look like he’s thinking about protesting. _I don’t need your handouts._ That’s the kind of thing Steve would’ve said. Did say all the time when they were younger. When he was bedridden and Bucky brought games to play with him. When he was fired from the grocery store for missing too many days, and Bucky paid for his prom ticket. When Bucky found him a date to prom.  

But Bucky doesn’t say anything. He just rolls his eyes and shoves his hand in his pocket and lets Steve pay without complaint. 

While they’re waiting on the pizza, another family comes in. A father and daughter. She’s six or seven, with pigtails in her hair. 

Steve’s watching the news on the T.V. hanging in the corner. Everything’s about the election these days. Bucky’s leaning against the counter, watching the street through the window. The man takes in his fatigues and the missing limb and says something to his daughter.

She shuffles over to Bucky and gives him a big smile, dimples on display. “Thank you for your service.”

Bucky’s eyes travel from the girl to her dad, brows furrowed. He looks down at the girl again, and she’s staring up at him expectantly. He gives a half shrug and says “S’nothing.” Then, cringing at his words, he adds “You’re welcome.”

The girl skips back to her dad, who gives Bucky a small nod. 

Bucky turns back to the window, avoiding Steve’s eye. There’s a tension in his shoulders that wasn’t there before. He moves like he’s going to cross his arms, only to realize he has one arm and nothing to cross it against. He scratches his shoulder to play it off and shoves his hand back in his pocket.

For all the letters they've exchanged over the last year, Steve doesn’t know much about what Bucky was doing over there. His mom said he was somewhere in northern Syria when he was caught in the detonation. And he knows, without actually being told, that he was involved in some kind of special forces. 

Bucky couldn’t talk about it in the letters, of course, it was all classified. But now that he’s here in person Steve wants to ask about it. He’s told Bucky about everything he missed, but Steve doesn’t know what he's missed.

It makes him feel sick to his stomach that there’s this huge thing in Bucky’s life that he can’t be a part of. They’ve been best friends since they were eight and nine. There was nothing they didn’t share with each other. Well, almost nothing.

But the one ounce of common sense Steve has in his possession tells him not to ask. To let Bucky talk about it when he’s ready. If he’s ever ready.

They walk back to the subway in silence. 

 

* * *

  

Steve doesn’t really know how he and Natasha became friends. 

He knows how they met. It was at freshman orientation. They grouped the college of fine arts by last name. Rogers and Romanoff sat next to each other. 

Steve was beginning to learn that when you were in college and you met someone you asked them what they were studying and where they were from. He was studying art; she was studying ballet. He was from Brooklyn, still living at home with his mother. She was living in the new dorm. She didn’t say much else, but she stuck by his side when they went on the campus tour. 

They were walking through the cafeteria when she said, “It’s a lie, you know?”

Steve had looked around for the cause of her statement. “What is?”

“The food,” she said. “They serve nice stuff on the first day. But give it a week or two and Aramark will be serving food that’s  barely edible.”

“Aramark?” The name stood out in Steve’s memory, something he read in the news. “You mean the company that served maggots to prisoners?”

“Yeah,” she said sadly. She studied him for a moment, then the corners of her mouth curled up. “Bet you’re glad you don’t live on campus.”

After that, they kept running into each other, and at the end of their first year, they found an apartment together.

After three years of friendship, she's no less of an enigma to him.  She was born in Russia, he knows. But she doesn’t like to talk about anything that happened before she moved to America. Except Clint. She met him before she moved to America.

He knows she’s a great roommate. Always pays the bills on time, keeps things clean, never has overnight guests. She’s a phenomenally talented dancer. She doesn’t take shit from anyone, and she’s a good judge of character. 

Steve’s not sure what he did to earn her trust, but he knows he did. Because as little as he understands about her, he's seen much more than she reveals to the rest of the world. He’s seen her with no makeup and curlers in her hair. He’s seen her cry watching _Breakfast at Tiffany’s._ He’s seen her dump a kale smoothie down the sink and fry up bacon instead, giving him a wink that says it's their little secret.

Steve desperately wants her to like Bucky. 

From a practical standpoint, if they were going to be living together, they needed to get along.  From a convenience standpoint, it would be nice if his two of his best friends enjoyed hanging out together. But Steve knows there's more to it than that. 

Nat’s friendship was a rare gift, Steve reasons. Whatever it was she saw in Steve, he wants her to see in Bucky too. 

He wasn’t as worried about Bucky liking Nat. Bucky got along with everyone. Everyone except bullies.  And even then, Bucky could charm over most of them if it weren’t for Steve getting in the way with his big mouth and even bigger sense of something to prove.

Natasha comes home from rehearsal not long after they get back with the pizza. They’re sprawled out on the couch (“ _Jesus, where’d you find this piece of shit? It reeks,” Bucky said when he laid eyes on it_ ). The pizza is on the coffee table in front of them, so they can help themselves to seconds and thirds without getting up. 

Bucky seems to have recovered from whatever cloud was hanging over him at the pizzeria. By the time they got back to the apartment, Bucky was acting like himself again, teasing and laughing. And if there was a tension around his eyes when he smiled, well he's had a long day. He was allowed to be tired.

Natasha drops her gym bag on the floor and drops herself on the couch between them.

“What are you watching?”

They’ve been flipping through the channels, trying to find something good. He holds out his hand so Nat can take the remote if she wants it.  She tells him what to do instead. “No, _no,_ next. No wait, go back. That was Dirty Dancing.” He does as she says and sets down the remote. 

She takes her bra off without removing her shirt. Steve had gone red all over the first time she did this in front of him, but he's used to it by now. Bucky squirms in his seat a little.

She helps herself to a slice of pepperoni, takes a bite, and then and only then, does she acknowledge Bucky. 

“You must be Barnes,” she says, giving him a once-over.

“In the flesh,” he says with a wry smile. 

“Natasha,” she says matter-of-factly. “Steve’s been quite abuzz, preparing for your arrival. He even picked up his art supplies.” 

Steve ducks his head. He was always leaving sketchbooks and paints around the apartment. He tries to keep it contained to his bedroom, most of the time, but, well. He’s sure he would have gotten around to cleaning it up eventually.  Wanting the apartment to be nice for Bucky’s arrival had finally provided sufficient motivation.

“Has he shown you your closet yet?" she asks. "You’re not claustrophobic are you?”

“Nat,” Steve warns. 

“What?” she asks. “You haven’t been selling him lies have you? This  is supposed to be a two bedroom apartment.”

Which was _technically_ true. Their lease said two bedrooms. But their laundry room was big enough to be a bedroom if it didn’t have a machine in it. And Wanda _had_ been staying there since Steve got back from Europe. It’s not like he set it up like that just so Bucky could move in with them. 

Bucky shakes his head. “Steve is a terrible liar. He couldn’t pull one over on me if he wanted to.”

Steve bristles at that. “I could lie if I wanted to.” Natasha and Bucky laugh at that, and Steve starts to regret introducing them to each other. 

“Name one fucking time that you’ve successfully lied to me,” Bucky demands.  Steve can think of a few examples, but none he feels like sharing now, so he accepts the teasing.

They spend the rest of the night on the couch watching movies and making their way through the pizza. It’s like their old sleepovers, except Natasha’s there too. But she’s a welcome addition as far as Steve’s concerned. 

Later in the night, Steve catches her eye. He wants to ask _“What do you think of him?”_ And Nat, being the scary genius that she is, reads his mind. She gives him a small nod. _“He’s cool.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to this story, and thank you for reading. Kudos and comments are incredibly appreciated :D You can also find [me on tumblr.](http://padmedala.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Also [check out this fanart ](https://jove999.tumblr.com/post/164931992907/war-veteran-bucky-art-student-steve-au) that partially inspired this chapter.


	2. September 18, 2015 & October 17, 2017

**_18 September 2015_**  

The Constitution was crowded tonight. Not that Peggy was surprised. The pub was a short walk from campus. Where else would everybody go the Friday after the first week of class? But that didn’t mean she had to enjoy being jostled by strangers. 

Their usual table near the back was already occupied when she and Howard arrived, so they were forced to stand by the door. It took a quarter of an hour just to get the bartender’s attention. Still, she was determined to not let the crowds dampen her moods.

This past summer had been like purgatory.  Between interning with Scotland Yard for her C.V., teaching classes at the recreation club for her bank account, and attending afternoon teas for her mother, she’d had little time to herself. So tonight, Peggy was going to knock back her favourite Scotch and catch up with her dearest friends.

Her first week of classes had been fine. Phillips was teaching her counter-terrorism course, and she liked him. He didn’t tolerate nonsense.  Fennhoff was still teaching Russian, which was unfortunate, but nothing she couldn’t handle.

She’s sipping her whisky, listening to Howard tell a rather amusing story that involved a _Daily Mail_ reporter, a lingerie model, and a flamingo, when Ana bolts upright and flails her arms in the direction of the bar.

“Steve!” she shouts to be heard over the din of the pub.

At the sound of his name, the lean, blonde man turns. He smiles when he sees Ana waving. As he elbows his way through the crowd, trying to keep his drink afloat the waves of bodies, Peggy recognises him. 

He sat two rows in front of her in world politics.  He spent most of the class doodling in his notebook. She’d thought he wasn’t paying attention until the class discussion turned to immigration policy. Alex Pierce, as per usual, had no shortage of ignorant things to say on the matter.

 

_The blonde’s head had whipped up, and without waiting for the teacher to call on him, he said, “Do you know how many terrorist attacks in the WWest are committed by  Islamic extremists? Less than a third. You know what percent are committed by men? Over ninety percent.  It would  literally  make more sense to ban people from entering the country for being male than for being Muslim  .” _

_His hands balled into fists as he continued, “But do we ban people for their gender? No, because that’s discrimination, and it’s wrong.  Just  like its wrong to ban an entire religion, or an entire region of people, for the actions of a few.” _

_Pierce had a retort on the tip of his tongue, but the other man wasn’t ready to give him the opportunity. “And another thing, these refugees, that you don’t want to accept because you’re afraid they might be terrorist, you do realise what they’re running from? People are more than fifty times as likely to die of Islamic terrorism in the Middle East than they are in countries like the U.K. or America.” _

 

Peggy stands a little straighter as the man named Steve approaches their table.  Anyone who wasn’t afraid to call out Pierce’s Islamaphobic dog-whistling, well, she at least wants to shake their hand.

Before he can say a word, Ana envelops the man in a warm hug, which he accepts while struggling not to spill his drink.

“Ana, good to see you again,” he says, and it takes Peggy by surprise again, how deep his voice is. It doesn’t match his body, but it’s a nice voice. 

“You too!” Ana says pulling away. “Everybody, this is Steve. We are in the same life drawing course, so we will be spending all year staring at naked people together.” 

Steve turns red, Howard howls with laughter, and Jarvis chokes on his drink.  Ana rubs his back as he recovers, but not without the self-satisfied smirk she gets whenever she manages to embarrass her husband in front of their friends.

“This is the handsome husband I was telling you about,” Ana says, wrapping her arms further around his waist. “And this,” she nods towards Peggy, “Is our friend Margaret Carter.”

Steve’s eyes widen as he turns his attention from the Jarvises to her. “Hi,” he says pushing his blonde hair away from his face. 

“Actually, Steve and I have a class together as well,” Peggy says, eyeing Steve up and down.

“Really ?” Ana gasps, looking far too excited at the news. “Well this is like fate,” she said giving Steve a significant look. “I had a feeling you two would get along and now I find out you’ve already met.”

Before Peggy can decipher what Ana means by _that,_ Stark is leaning across everyone’s drinks to grab Steve’s hand, “And I’m Howard Stark .”

“You’re an exchange student too?” Steve asks, recognising Howard's distinctively American drawl.

“Exchange student? God no! Cute that you would thing that though,” he says. Steve’s brows draw together, but Howard makes no move to explain himself.

Rolling her eyes, Peggy elaborates “Howard is as old as the rest of us. But he graduated university at an  unreasonably young age.”

“Seventeen,” Howard says. “M.I.T.”

“Now he works for a research institute in London,” Jarvis adds.

The Stark and Jarvis families had been close for generations, and when Howard moved to England, Edwin was the only person he knew. Working in an office comprised almost entirely of men twice his age — “Male, pale, and frail,” Howard said — he spent most of his free time bumming around the university. He was a pain in the arse most of the time, but underneath the bravado, Peggy knew he was a loyal friend to Jarvis.

“He gets paid quite a lot to do very little.  Leaving him with abundant free time to pester us simpletons who are still trying to earn an education .” Peggy says with a glare towards Howard, which he ignores.

“Like how just telling them about this new fondue restaurant,” Howard says launching into another self-aggrandising story.

This was how these evenings usually went.  Howard would buy the first round, and then a few more rounds later in the night because he  was loaded and couldn’t handle his alcohol as well as he thought he could . He would entertain them with tales of his one-night-stands. Jarvis would admonish him, and Peggy would chime in with her own sarcastic quips.  The more Ana drank the more handsy she became, and when Mr. Jarvis’s resilience wore thin he would announce that it was time they turned in for the night.

Then, depending on the kind of week they had, sometimes Howard and Peggy would let Jarvis make sure they got home safe.  He tended to stay  fairly sober at these affairs, lest inebriation interfere with his ability to serve as the group’s unofficial Mom Friend. Other nights, Peggy and Howard would stay and try to drink the other under the table. Howard would challenge her to a game of darts. Or pool. And one time, against Peggy’s better judgement, they’d bet on who could pull a woman that had  been abandoned at the bar.

Peggy was proud to say she had yet to lose a challenge to Stark.

Steve fit  seamlessly into their routine. He could handle his alcohol better than his small frame would suggest.  His smart mouth,  apparently, was not reserved for the classroom, because he ribs Howard along with the rest of them.

Peggy tells the story of how she broke into her headmasters home, stole his wife’s pants, and made off with a bottle of brandy, and Steve seems like he’s having trouble breathing from laughing too hard. But then Steve comes back with his own prank story.

“There was a new kid in our class, his family had just moved from Vietnam. So he was still learning English,” Steve illustrates.

“And there was this other guy, Brock. Wouldn’t stop making fun of the kid’s accent. I was ready to teach the guy a lesson,” Steve mimes punching himself with a self-deprecating laugh. “But my friend convinces me to do things his way for once.  So I cause a distraction, while Bucky steals Brock’s phone, and he changes the language settings to Vietnamese. You shoulda seen the look on Yinsen’s face when he realised that if Brock ever wanted to use his phone again, he was gonna have to be nice to him.”

Howard decides to play a prank of his own, convincing Steve to order the most disgusting drinks on the menu. Steve acts real nice about it. But then he leans into Peggy and whispers that he’ll find a way to get him back later.

When Ana’s hand lands, not so much on Jarvis’s knee as on his crotch, Steve politely averts his eyes. And when Howard excuses himself along with the happy couple, Steve and Peggy are left alone at the table.

Steve looks down at his drink and asks, “So, um, what do you study?”

It’s such a hard turn from drunken antics to awkward small talk that that Peggy has to purse her lips to stifle a laugh.

“Political science and international studies.”

He nods and runs a hand through his hair. _A nervous tick,_ Peggy notes. “And what do you want to do with that?” he asks.

Peggy hesitates before answering. But she’s  just on the right side of sloshed, so she says, “I want to work for an international intelligence agency.”

She raises a brow at Steve, challenging him to comment on her desired line of work. She was used to hearing shit for it. Her parents, her friends, even some of her professors had tried to talk her out of it. She’s  been told that she wouldn’t make the cut. Told she would  be wasted in government bureaucracy. Told it was too dangerous. Told she would regret not prioritising a family over her career. Peggy had grown accustomed to dismissing whatever critical comments new acquaintances would offer.

But Steve smiles brightly. “That’s awesome. Doing something that protects people, I admire that.”

Peggy studies him for a moment, searching for a sign he was only saying that to be polite, or to impress her. But everything about his face, his mannerisms seems genuine. The entire time she’d known him, albeit only a few hours, he’s seemed genuine.

“What about you?” she asks. “Why art?”

There’s a brief tension in his shoulders — Peggy imagines she’s not only one who was less than encouraged to pursue her major of choice — but then he sighs and says, “Art wasn’t really my first choice. I think I just fell back on it because it’s the only thing I’m good at. I wanted to join the military.”

And that surprises her.  She tries to picture this man, who was shorter than her, though not by much, and probably weighed less, in a boot camp setting, running for miles, crawling through mud, performing endless push-ups.  But then she remembers what he was like in class, full of passion and righteousness, and the idea doesn’t seem so strange.

Steve scratches at the label on his beer bottle. “I don’t know. I ’ve been interested in stuff like that since I was a kid.  When other kids had Pokemon, I had books about tactical strategy,” he says with a self-deprecating laugh.

“My grandfather served in World War II, so I guess that might’ve had something to do with it. I wanted to follow in his footsteps.  I tried to enlist when I graduated high school, but there’s too much wrong with me: Asthma, bad eyesight, half deaf in my left ear from all the infections I got as a kid,” he says counting the conditions on his fingers.

“I also had all these scares with my heart, but about a year ago they came out with this new miracle drug, so thankfully that’s a bit better. A weak heart and weak lungs aren’t exactly the best combination,” he says, ruefully quirking the corners of his lips.

“It sounds like a miracle you’re even alive,” Peggy says.

“I like to think I’ve stayed alive for a reason. You know, that my life will serve some greater purpose,” His gaze turns somber. “My best friend, the one who had the idea to mess with the kid’s cell phone, he always said I’m  just too stubborn to kick the bucket.”

Peggy laughs a little and that, and Steve meets her eyes again.

“Having a mom that’s a nurse probably helped as well. She was so relieved when the army turned me down. But then, Bucky decided to enlist. He’s like a second son to her, so she panicked all over again.”

“He shared your fascination with the military?”

Steve takes a long sip of his beer before answering, “Not really. His senior year, well, it was a hard time for him, you could say. And he’s a smart guy, but his grades weren't as good as mine. Skipped school too much, I guess.” He shrugs. “I did too, only I could say I was sick and the teachers would believe me. Plus I've got, like a photographic memory,” he taps the side of his head for emphasis.

“God wanted to make up for all the things wrong with me.  Anyway, scholarships weren't going to be much of an option for Bucky. And he didn't want to take out a bunch of student loans. So he figured if he wanted to go to college, the G.I. Bill was the best way to pay for it .”

“This upset you?” Peggy says, not really a question.

“I guess, I felt like he was doing it for the wrong reasons.” Steve hesitates before adding, “And if I'm being honest with myself, I was jealous.”

“That’s a rubbish feeling,” Peggy says. “When you feel like someone else has been handed the thing you’ve worked hard for. I know a little of what that’s like.”

 

* * *

 

 

 ** _17 October 2017_**  

 

Peggy can’t believe, out of all the people he could have chosen, Dooley decides to give the mission to Thompson. 

He doesn’t even speak Russian for Christ’s sake. His specialty is North Korea. Peggy isn’t too bloody proud to admit that he’s a good agent, but no one at this bureau had more experience in Russia than she does. Five months embedded in Moscow hunting down informants with ties to the Kremlin.  Another four working with the decryption team in London translating records linked to troll farms. 

As soon as Dooley emerges from his office, Peggy is on his heels. Manoeuvring around desks to follow him to the coffee cart. “Chief Dooley, may I speak with you.”

“I’d think you could find something better to do,” he says gruffly.

“I wanted to talk to you about the St. Petersburg mission, sir. It’s top priority.”

Dooley scans the shelf of coffee tops. “Who’s be using my mug,” he grumbles, grabbing a random mug and setting it underneath the Keurig. “You’re not on the St. Petersburg mission, Carter,” he says riffling through the drawers for a K-cup.

“That’s why I wanted to speak with you. I  really think you should reconsider your assignments.”

Dooley scowls.“Thompson’s the one who found the lead. He gets to take point,” Dooley says forcing the K-cup into place and slamming the lid shut. “Johnson speaks Russian and Miller’s got the most experience with asset extraction.”

“With all due respect, sir. I also speak Russian. I spent five months in Moscow doing  precisely this kind of HUMINT.”

“A stay that ended in a mission failure, loss of an asset, and you being sent home on psychological leave,” Dooley says, punching the buttons on the coffee machine with each point. “Is that right? Or did I misread your file?”

Peggy forces herself to take a deep breath.  “While that is  technically correct, it also leaves out crucial details, not least of which, that I  was cleared for field work two months ago .”

Dooley barely spares her a glance before he goes back to fiddling with the Keurig, which has yet to dispense any coffee. “ I think I’m going to have you take the test again with our guys. Not that I don’t trust the Brits, but I can’t risk you going hysterical when you’re in the field with our men.”

 _Hysterical?_ _Our_ men? _Could you be any more_ _patently_ _sexist?_ Peggy thinks. She digs her nails into her palms to stop herself from saying something she’ll regret.

She is not naive, she knows that she’s a junior agent, new to the office, but she thinks she could at least be _on_ the mission.  She was transferred to the New York bureau three weeks ago to serve as an inter-agency liaison between the C.I.A. and S.I.S. on the election investigation. And in those three weeks, she’s barely done anything that couldn’t have been assigned to a secretary with a high enough security clearance. Completing paperwork, going on lunch runs, _filing._

Dooley slaps the Keurig hard enough to shake the coffee cart. “Damn thing! We spend a hundred bucks on this piece of shit, and it doesn’t even work.”

And Peggy can’t stop herself from rolling her eyes as she points at the reservoir. “It’s out of water, sir.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

“You want me to top you off?” Peggy looks up from her phone to see the waitress gesture to her mug with the coffee pot. She’s giving Peggy a look that says _Hellooo, Earth to the Brunette with Bloodshot Eyes._

_“_ Uh, yes. Please,” Peggy mutters. She’s finished her sandwich, but she’s been catching up with the day’s news and isn’t in a hurry to leave the restaurant.

The waitress refills the mug.  It’s the younger woman, the one with the nice ash blonde hair. Peggy has seen her at the L&L Café before, but she never sat in her section. Peggy likes to sit in the booths in the front, where she can keep an eye on all the exits. A habit she picked up during training at Fort Moncton. 

The diner is on the same block as her flat, and open twenty-four hours. So Peggy comes in sometimes on nights she works late, which is more often than not. The food is only passible, but her tiny studio doesn’t have a real kitchen, and sometimes she needs a hot meal.

The waitress studies her while she pours the coffee. “Everything alright?”

Peggy sighs. “I’m fine. If you don’t count work,” Peggy says, going for a joke but her tone falling flat.

Word had gotten around the office that she requested to be assigned to the St. Petersburg mission. She’d overheard Thompson and Flynn talking about it in the locker room.

 

_“I heard she tried to recruit a scientist from Rosneft.”_

_“What's a research scientist gonna know about election hacking. He was_ _probably_ _just_ _trying to get a green card.”_

_“_ _Maybe_ _Carter had a soft spot for him. If you know what I mean.”_

 

Information on her assignment in Moscow was supposed to be classified. So naturally a few key details had leaked into the office rumour mill, but nobody actually had the facts straight. Wilkes was working for _Gazprom_ , not Rosneft. And she hadn’t been _fucking_ him. 

Sousa, the dumb softie that he was, had told Thompson and Flynn to cut it out.  Which of course meant that by the end of the day tomorrow half the office would think _they_ were sleeping together.

Peggy has no interest in getting involved with anyone she works with. And she’s not really supposed to get involved with people outside the agency. She’s _definitely_ not supposed to tell them what she does for a living. And it’s difficult to have a relationship with someone when you can’t share anything with them. Casual sex was on the table, she supposed, but it didn’t  really appeal to her. Not since her last relationship ended.

The server, whose name tag reads Angie, makes a _pfft_ sound. “Tell me about it.” She rests her hip against the table, back to the rest of the restaurant. “No,  seriously, tell me about it. Where do you work?”

Peggy’s cover flows from her mouth automatically. “I’m a project manager with AT&T.”

Angela raises a brow. “AT&T?  Really? Will you tell ‘em to stop messing up my bill?”

“Of course, what name should I give them?”

“Angela Martinelli, but you can call me Angie,” she says with a grin. “So what’s AT&T doing that’s got you down?”

 _Don’t lie if you don’t have to,_ her commanding officer had taught her. _The best lies_ _are steeped_ _in truth._ So Peggy says, “I got passed over for a promotion.”

Ordinary human behaviour, even friendly behaviour would dictate that a stranger could say “I’m sorry” or “That sucks” and move on with their life.

Instead, Angie surreptitiously surveys the restaurant and slides into the booth across from Peggy. “I had an audition today uptown. Took three trains to get there. Got two bars into All That Jazz before they cut me off. I guess I wasn’t all that.” She tilts her head and gives Peggy a tight-lipped smile.

“That’s more than they’d let me sing,” Peggy says. “I’m afraid I can’t carry a tune.”

Angie shakes her head. “Doesn’t matter when you’ve got legs like yours.” Peggy averts her eyes towards her plate, but she can’t help the smile that creeps across her face.

“We all gotta pay our dues. Even if it takes time,” Angie says. Under most circumstances, it would irritate Peggy, this kind of unsolicited advice. But there’s nothing condescending about Angie’s tone. Nothing that says _I know better than you._ There’s kindness and warmth and encouragement.

Peggy’s on the verge of saying something, maybe flirting a little, because how else was she supposed to take the comment on her legs? But then the man sitting two tables over speaks up. “Excuse me,” he says, his tone anything but polite. “Do you still work here?”

Angie clenches her jaw. “I gotta go.”

Peggy recognises the man. Large frame, about 5’10. She’s seen him here before. Always in a suit, usually came in around seven.

“Is he a regular?”  she asks Angie, because ordinary, non-intelligence-agent people don't keep catalogues of the physique and behaviour of every person they come across in their brain.

“Yeah, but a regular _what,”_ she says raising her eyebrows. _“_ I’m not allowed to say on the clock.”

 

* * *

 

After that night, dinners at the L&L Café become a regular occurrence.  Peggy tells herself it’s because of the convenience of the location and has nothing to do with the cute waitress who always has a megawatt smile for her. It’s foolish, she knows, for someone in her line of work to settle into such a predictable routine. Dangerous even. 

She switches up which nights she eats there and tells herself that’s enough. Angie is there every night except Sundays, Peggy learns. She always works the graveyard shift, so she can go to auditions during the day.

She moved to New York four years ago, forgoing university to follow her dream of being a Broadway star.  She’s been in a few black box plays. And in the workshops for Mean Girls, but she didn’t get asked to join the cast in D.C. She’s still waiting on her big break, but no matter how many times they give her the hook, she remains unwaveringly optimistic.

Angie always stops by Peggy’s booth between taking care of her other tables to ask about her day. Peggy  can’t talk about what she does, so she tells her about her coworkers (in vague terms), about acclimating to New York (Angie informs her where she can find the best pizza), whether her day was good day or bad (Usually the later, since she’s been tasked with digitalising the office archives).

Peggy can’t say much, but Angie talks enough for the both of them.

Usually, she tells Peggy about the disastrous auditions she goes to.  Atrocious sides, sleazy casting directors, obsessive actors.

“This girl shows up in a full ballgown. Hoop skirt, cape, elbow-length gloves, the whole shebang. I mean, wanting to be a Disney princess, I get that. But you just don’t show up to an audition like that. I don’t know how she got through the choreo.”

Other nights she tells Peggy about the odd jobs she works in between acting and bussing tables. She runs errands for people wealthy enough to afford that sort of thing. She walks a lot of dogs.

“I’m really more of a cat person,” she says. “And they can sense it on me. Because they go crazy whenever I show up. They start running around the room like they’re stuck in the dry cycle.” She says rotating her hand to drive her point home.

She doesn’t have a cat, but she does live with three other girls.  There’s Mary, the law student; Eva, who does backup vocals for a few recording studios in town; and Sarah, the personal assistant to some big shot magazine editor. From the way Angie tells it, Sarah’s sexual exploits would put Stark to shame.

“I’m not one to judge what anybody gets up to in the bedroom, but our rooms share a wall. A wall that’s about as thick as card stock, if you get what I’m saying.”

When Angie runs out of stories about her roommates, there's her extended family to talk about. She comes from a big Italian family in Passaic. Her cousin Fredi recently had her second baby, a boy this time, much to the grandparents’ delight.  Her aunt Estelle is redoing her kitchen, and finally getting rid of that hideous wallpaper. Her cousin Donnie just got out of jail, but Peggy already knew that.

If she was going to throw caution to the wind by eating at the same restaurant multiple times a week, she at least had to run a background check on the waitress. The waitress that had made contact with _her_ _._ Something anyone who had passed basic could tell you was a red flag.

Peggy felt a little guilty about it, especially when the background check came back clear. There was nothing in her record to suggest Angie was anything other than she professed to be.  Aside from the cousin who had been arrested for marijuana possession, her record was crystal clear.

“They got him on intent to distribute, but if I know Donnie he  was gonna smoke it all himself.” She imitates taking a drag on a joint with an exaggerated cross-eyed expression

It’s a strange dynamic. Peggy is aloof an enigmatic, and Angie is vibrant and full of life. Peggy keeps expecting Angie too tire of her standoffishness. To give of hope of befriending her. She’d be better off for it. But she hasn’t tired yet, and Peggy is grateful for it.

She’s tried to keep in touch with Howard and the Jarvises, her friends from university, but with eight hours and an ocean between them, it’s easier said than done. She’s friendly with Sousa and Rose at the office, but they’re not _friends._ So she has no one to talk to, except Angie.

One night she’s at Peggy’s side as soon as she walks through the door. “I’m glad you came by tonight.”

Peggy tries to fight the smile that inevitably appears whenever Angie’s around. “Really? Why’s that?” she asks, sliding into her usual booth.

“I’ve got an audition for My Fair Lady tomorrow, and I need to practice my accent.”  She pulls out her notepad and, assuming the most ostentatiously posh voice asks, “What would you like to order this evening, madam?” adding a small curtsey at the end that makes Peggy giggle. Not a laugh or a snort, an actual _giggle._ She can’t remember the last time she giggled.

“Right, how long do you have to prepare?”

Reverting to her usual American cadence, “About twelve hours, why?”

“ Y ou may need _a little_ more practice,” Peggy says, dripping with sarcasm.

“That’s what you’re here for, English,” Angie says, adding a wink.

The epithet sticks. After that night it’s “Hey, English, what can I get for you” and “Night, English. Sweet dreams!”

Peggy pretends to be annoyed.

Unfortunately, she’s not the only one getting called names. The tosser that interrupted them the first time they talked still comes to the diner every Tuesday. He never fails to find something to complain about.”

 

_“Hey honey, you back there.”_

 

_“You call this a BLT?”_

 

_“Would it kill you smile, Sweetheart?”_

 

Angie handles it all with disarming charm and wit. Peggy would have punched him by now. It’s a testament to Angie’s acting that she can roll her eyes at Peggy and turn around with a smile for him. Peggy tells her to talk to the manager, but Angie dismisses the suggestion. 

“He wouldn’t care. The customer is always right, after all.” Seeing Peggy’s frown she adds, “Don’t worry about it, English. It’s nothing I can’t handle.”

One night the man breaks from his habits to order a steak. Maybe he’s celebrating something, judging from the air of triumph he had when he walked in. He takes one look at the plate that Angie sets in front of it and says, “You know the difference between rare and well-done, don’t you Sugar?”

“Believe it or not,” she says flatly.

“Take it back.  Just get me my usual sandwich. Why I order steak at a place like this.”

Angie takes the steak and turns towards the kitchen, when he adds, “And next time don’t get smart. You’re brains aren’t your best feature.” He slaps her rear, and Angie goes still. She clenches her jaw and walks to the kitchen.

Blood boiling, Peggy’s brain is already considering her options. She knows she can’t sit by and watch this man’s harassment any longer. She could talk to the management for Angie, they might be more sympathetic to a third party account. She could wait until he leaves, confront him in the ally. _Dear God, was she turning into Steve?_

Instead, her eyes follow Angie until she disappears to the kitchen. She gathers her jacket, he purse, and a fork.

By the time she’s done threatening him, he's throwing the contents of his wallet on the table for what's sure to be the tip Angie's seen in a while. Peggy is confident he won't be bothering Angie again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Isn’t funny that the Soviet Union sought to undermine American democracy in the 1940s and its 2018 and Russia is still trying to undermine Western democracy? Isn’t it funny that women still don’t get treated as equals in the office and are harassed at work? It’s like a barely have to rewrite Agent Carter at all. And by funny, I mean really depressing. 
> 
> At the risk of being overly political, I just want to say that everything Steve said in class is true and I brought the receipts if you’re interested: [ Far-Right terrorism is more than twice as common as Islamic extremism, ](https://www.revealnews.org/article/home-is-where-the-hate-is/)[ People in the middle east are more than 50x as likely to die of Islamic terrorism than people in Western Europe, ](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/global-terrorism-victims-western-europe-victims-less-1-per-cent-islamist-domestic-a7910981.html)[ 93% of post-9/11 jihadist terrorism in America was committed by men. ](https://www.newamerica.org/in-depth/terrorism-in-america/who-are-terrorists/)[ Also of 97% of mass shootings in the US have been committed by men.](https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/17/gun-violence-masculinity-216321)


	3. September 26, 2015 & October 8, 2016

_** 26 September 2015 ** _

 

It takes a few weeks for Steve to settle into a routine.  He memorizes the layout of campus, introduces himself to his professors, learns the cheap restaurants within walking distance. He hangs out with the other guys on his hall a few more times — when he isn’t too busy trying to stay afloat in all the reading he ’s been assigned, way more than he had back in the States — but he spends the rest of his days exploring London.

Turns out, the tube isn’t too different from the subway. And there are plenty of museums that are free to students. He likes the Tate Modern the best.  It’s on the other side of the river, where there are fewer business suits and more interesting hair choices. Right around the corner, there’s the Globe, and if that isn’t something to marvel at.  Modern masterpieces housed spitting distance from where the greatest playwright performed, in a theatre older than his country.

London is full of places like that. The Eye is across the street from Big Ben and Westminster Abbey.  The Tower of London is right next to the Leadenhall Building, the one they call the cheese grater. Everywhere people rush by pieces of history more interested in the Starbucks across the street

Steve is on the tour of Churchill’s war rooms when he realizes. He’s been spending all his time surrounded by tourists. Outside of class, he’s barely spoken to anyone who’s U.K. born and bred. He takes a long look at the selfie sticks and fanny packs and decides something has to change.

So the next time he’s in the student union he studies the flyers hanging on the board near the bookstore.  Maybe he should join the LGBTQ alliance? Film Club could be interesting.  Natasha used to max out her library card checking out enough DVDs so they could have all-day movie marathons.

He would’ve signed up for Debate Club if he didn’t already get enough of that in his world politics class. Some of the guys in there were a real piece of work.  The school has a couple of sports clubs. Things like rowing and badminton and equestrian.  He contemplates copying down the football information before he realizes he’s thinking of a different kind of football.

A poster for kickboxing lessons catches his eye, and the more he thinks about it the more it sounds like a great idea.  Despite ample experience getting into fights, Steve’s never received any formal martial arts training.

The clean lettering states that all experience levels were welcome. And it’s at the perfect time, Wednesday nights, right after his Renaissance Painting class. He pulls out his phone and snaps a photo of the poster.

 

* * *

 

 

“To the new students, my name is Peggy Carter. Today I’ll be covering the basic punches used in kickboxing. Next week, we’ll divide into groups according to skill level .” 

As if he wasn’t already on board with the idea, seeing Peggy standing at the front of the class sold Steve on kickboxing lessons.

The week after Ana introduced them at the pub, Peggy switched seats to sit beside him in World Politics. He's been sure to do all the reading every week since then, something he couldn’t say about his other classes.

Something about her presence made Steve anxious to impress. He sits up a straighter, and runs his fingers through his hair to make sure it was laying right. He used to tease Bucky relentlessly for how he tousled his hair when he would flirt with the girls in their grade. But Steve can’t help it. 

Steve knows he’s well on his way to a full-blown crush, but there’s something more to it than that. Something he hasn’t felt with any of his other passing infatuations.  Peggy always has an air of confidence around her, a steely gaze and squared shoulders that make it seem like the world is moving around her. And it’s more than attractive, Steve . . . he’s _envious_ of it. 

Ana is starting to catch on. She told Steve to invite Peggy along next time he goes to a museum. But Steve’s not _delusional_. Peggy’s gorgeous, with her long brown hair and a knock-out figure. What would a girl like that see in a skinny punk like him? 

Except that, when he walks into the gym, she spots him in an instant. And she gives him a small smile. A pleased look, like he answered correctly on a test he didn’t realize he was taking. She gives him that look in class sometimes, after he says something smart. The corners of her lips, always adorned ruby red, will quirk up, but the real smile is in her eyes.  She’ll lean into his space to add her own commentary to the lectures. And he’ll catch a whiff of her perfume and he’ll indulge himself in thinking that maybe he’s not so crazy for liking her.

Peggy stands in front of the class in simple, loose-fitting sweats and a tank top, a striking change from the blazers and button-ups she wore to class. He’s finding it hard not to admire her toned arms as she explained the different kinds of punches they would be learning.

 Behind him, a couple of guys are laughing. Steves tries to tune them out. 

“Didn’t know they’d have some girl teaching us,” mumbled one of the men to his friend. 

Steve was about to tell the guy to show some respect when Peggy appears by his side facing the boys.

“What’s your name?” she asks in a clipped tone. 

“Gilmore Hodge, princess.”

Peggy’s eyes narrow, but she maintains her composure. “Put your right foot forward please, Mr. Hodge.”

He snorts. ”Are we dancing? ‘Cause I got a few moves I know you'll like,” Hodge says with a wink. 

In an instant, Peggy swings a punch straight to his jaw, and Hodge hits the mats. Steve has to force himself not to laugh out loud.

Without blinking an eye, Peggy continues her lesson, “Like I said, the hook is usually the most powerful punch in your arsenal. Now if everyone would partner up to practice, I’ll walk around to offer further instruction.”

Steve partners with the man beside him, who introduces himself as Monty. He was taller than Steve, but far from the biggest guy in the room.  They start walking through the different kinds of punches Peggy demonstrates, while she works her way across the room, correcting people’s technique.

Before long, Steve and Monty got bored with the moves she had demonstrated.  First, they speed up their movements, punching at normal speed rather than walking through the motions. Then they began to add their own moves, and after a few minutes, the practice began to resemble an actual fight. 

He blocks a few punches with his forearms before Monty lands one on his temple. He pushes through the dizziness to return the favor with an uppercut to Monty’s jaw. They trade blows back and forth before Monty lands a tough hit that sends Steve to the ground. Nothing injured but his pride, Steve stands right back up and swings at Monty’s side. But his windup is erratic and Monty easily dodges. 

Monty retaliates and sends him sprawling on the floor again. At least the floors were covered in mats, Steve thinks. They’re a good deal softer than pavement and smelled moderately better than a pile of garbage. Steve rolls over to push himself off the ground and comes face to feet with a pair of red sneakers. Peggy extends her hand to help him up. 

She’s frowning at him, and Steve realizes she must have been watching their fight for a while.  “ We might have gotten a little carried away,” he says, trying to sound apologetic but coming out breathless.

“You fight like you’re a man twice your size,” she says matter-of-factly

And that . . . hurts. Hurts more than Steve cares to admit. He’s had people talking down to him his whole life. Even Bucky always chided him for starting fights he had no chance of winning.  Just because he’s shorter than average doesn’t make him some damsel incapable of taking care of himself. 

“Maybe ‘cause I’m used to fighting men twice my size,” he says, puffing his chest out. 

Peggy raises a brow. “You know, a small stature isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If you appreciate how to use it to your advantage. “

“And how do I use it to my advantage?” he asks with a huff.

She studies him up and down. “Well, first off, you’re blocking all of his hits with your arms. Or worse, you let him hit you. Try ducking and dodging some of them instead. When you’re fighting someone bigger, odds are you’re going to be faster.” 

To prove her point, she swings her fist toward him just slow enough so that he can easily weave out of the way. As she’s explaining, Steve realizes she’s speaking from experience.  He wouldn’t call Peggy petite, but she has to know a thing or two about fighting someone bigger and stronger than herself.

“Good. Dugan? You mind helping me  demonstrate ?” She calls over a broad-shouldered red-head. He’s a foot taller than Steve, and he can’t stop staring at his handlebar mustache. 

“Steve, this is Dugan. Don’t let him hit you.”

Peggy spends the next ten minutes walking him through techniques to take on the new opponent. 

“Keep your distance. If you let him grapple you, you’re in trouble.”

Steve moves toward Dugan for a combo of quick jabs then darts back. 

“Use his weight against him. Throw him off balance.”

Steve sends a kick to his shin and dives to the side as Dugan stumbles and loses the force behind his punch. 

“In a real self-defense situation, you have to be resourceful. Use things in the environment as a weapon.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Steve notices that Peggy is using this as a demonstration for the other students. He and Dugan have an audience. 

He feigns left. Then while Dugan’s distracted, he moves in for an overhand punch. Dugan is forced to stumble back a few steps as he takes the impact of the punch.  Using his opponent’s imbalance to his advantage, Steve follows the punch with a firm front kick that knocks him to the floor.

He’s winded as hell, and he forces himself to take deep breaths and he turns to Peggy for approval.

“You’d have more force behind your kick if you rotated your hips.” Her words are critical, but the small fond look on her face that betrays her approval. 

 

At the end of class, Steve hangs around while she answers the other students lingering questions.

“I hope you didn’t mind me using you as an example. If it’s any consolation, you were a fast learner”

Steve thought he ought to feel embarrassed for being called out, but instead, he felt proud that she chose him. 

Steve shrugs, and like a smartass, he says,  “I don’t know. I’d say you still owe me.”

“Do you want to grab a bite?” Peggy asks. “ I’m starved, and there’s a brilliant curry house around the corner. Jarvis and I usually eat out after class, but tonight is his and Ana’s anniversary, so I imagine he’s otherwise occupied.” 

 

* * *

 

 

The curry is as delicious as Peggy promised. She’s shoving forkfuls of it in her mouth in a very unladylike manner. It jars his image of her. She always shows up to class dressed like she was going to work at the office, even when other students were in jeans and sweatshirts. Hair styled and color on her lips. But now she’s sweaty and her hair is pulled into a frazzled pony-tail. Not that it makes her any less beautiful, Steve thinks. 

“So where’d you learn to fight?” he asks.  

Peggy smirks like it’s an inside joke. “Mostly from my brother.  Eventually, my mother let me sign up for proper lessons, but after years of wrestling with Michael, it was hard for me to break the bad habits I’d formed .”

“Bad habits?”

“Biting. Kicking him in the groin. Fighting dirty,” she shrugs but there’s a spark in her eyes.“Who taught you?”

“Before today?”  Steve asks, because he  really hadn’t realized how much he didn’t know until Peggy was showing him a dozen ways his form could be better . “I guess Bucky.”

“Your friend in the army?” She says through the food in her mouth. “How’s he doing?”

“Uh, I don’t know,” Steve ducks his head. He hasn’t heard from Bucky in over a year. 

He tried, at first.  He would send him letters and Bucky would write back complaining about boot camp in a way that left Steve feeling sick with envy. _“You’re not missing much, Stevie. The food here is shit. I can’t feel my legs they made us run so fucking much today.”_ Then the letters petered out after he was deployed. Steve started putting less and less effort into his replies. Then the letters stopped coming all together. 

He still hears updates from Bucky’s parents every now and again, but he tries to put him out of his mind. Because thinking about Bucky left him feeling bitter and left-behind and fearful and guilty.

Of course, trying to think about Bucky was like trying not to think about his own nose. Bucky was in nearly every memory he had from eight to eighteen. 

“We haven’t done a good job of keeping in touch,” Steve tells Peggy.

Peggy’s eyes go distant, and she sighs deeply. In that moment she seems far older than twenty. “You said he’s your best friend?"

“Yes.”

 “You should reach out to him. As soon as you can. You never know what’s going to happen over there, or anywhere for that matter,” she said in a tone that left no room for argument. “If anything happened to him, you’d never stop regretting that you left things on bad terms.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

_ **8 October 2016** _

 

Bucky goes to stay with his parents for almost two weeks. 

 

It feels like a cruel joke to Steve. The universe gives him back only to take him away again right away.  

Not that he’d ever complained about it. He’s got no right to blame Bucky for wanting to see his parents. He’s not angry at Bucky, just angry. 

So he doesn’t complain about it. When he was a kid, he always had the same complaint. _“It’s not fair,”_ he would whine when he couldn’t go outside and play because he was still recovering from a nasty bout of flu. Or when Bucky got a Wii for Christmas while Steve got books and socks. 

His mom always had the same response: “Life’s not fair.” Steve _hated_ that.  Just because the world’s not fair doesn’t mean people should stop trying to make it that way, Steve thought. It wasn’t fair that SSam was pulled over three times last semester alone. Wasn’t fair that people stared at Clint when he talked, just because he talked with his hands. And it wasn’t fair that Bucky lost an arm and three years of his life to a war people can barely remember we’re fighting.

So in the grand scheme of fate being cruel, Steve has no right to complain about Bucky being gone for two weeks.

It doesn’t make him miss him any less.

Steve writes him a letter, like he started sending again when he was in England. It feels like a joke that’s not really funny. 

 

_Dear Bucky,_

_How’s Shelbyville? Are you missing Syria yet? When you get bored out of your skull, miss Brooklyn instead. It’s still here waiting for you._

_Last night we ordered takeout from the Indian place on Henry Street I’ve been meaning to try. Nat said it was good, but I couldn’t help comparing it to the place I always ate at in London. Most English food is foul, but they’ve got good Indian food._

_We’ll have to find something fun to do when you’re back. I can get into 21 and up clubs now. I know that never stopped you, but it could be fun to go together._

_How are your parents? Winnie got Snapchat a few months ago, so that’s how I’ve been keeping up with them._ _Mostly it’s pictures of her garden, but about once a month they’ll have a date night and they’ll send me a picture of them all dolled up._ _It’s sweet. My mom refuses to download the app._ _Maybe_ _you could convince her, you always knew how to sweet talk her for second helpings._

_I don’t have much else to update you on, considering you were here a few days ago. Don’t stay in Indiana too long, ok? I need you here._ _Nat’s developed a new interest in meddling in my life, and I need a distraction._  

_Love,_

_Steve_

 

* * *

 

When Bucky finally returns to New York, it doesn’t take them long to settle into a routine. Bucky wakes up early every morning and goes on a long run. Some days he’s not back by the time Steve leaves for school. Nat, who doesn’t have to be at the studio until noon, reassures Steve that he’s never gone for more than a few hours. 

Bucky registers to start school in the spring semester. He starts taking online classes to refresh what he learned in high school. He goes to physical therapy on Monday and Wednesday. They give him a prosthetic arm and start teaching him how to use it.

Steve comes home from school in the late afternoon, and he’ll make dinner for both of them. On Fridays, or if Steve’s feeling like he had a long day, they’ll get take out. His mom brings dishes over about once a week. She knows to cook enough for an extra person. They’ll eat side-by-side on the couch, Steve working on homework and Bucky on his laptop.

Natasha comes home from rehearsal and heats up their leftovers. A few nights a week, Steve goes to the studio to paint. Bucky is usually in his room by the time he gets home. 

So it takes him a while to realize he’s not sleeping.

One night Steve comes home after working in the studio and finds Bucky sitting on the couch. He looks like he hasn’t moved since Steve left. It’s after 2 a.m., Steve knows, because he missed the last train and had to take a Lyft to the apartment. 

When he walks in Bucky looks up at him like he’s a kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. 

Steve laughs softly. “Isn’t it past your bedtime?”

“You’re up too,” Bucky says defensively. 

“Not for long,” Steve says. And true to his word, he brushes his teeth, kicks off his jeans, and collapses into his bed within minutes. 

He doesn’t think much of it — he’s not immune to wasting time on his laptop until the early morning himself — until a week later. One night, he gets up around four because he needs to piss when he hears voices in the kitchen. 

He panics for a moment before he realizes it’s just Bucky and Nat. He’s close enough to recognize their voices, but not enough to make out what they're saying. Curiosity is screeching at him to move closer to the kitchen.  But Bucky was special ops and Natasha has her own eerie skill set and Steve ’s been known to trip over his own feet on a flat surface. So he’s pretty sure if he moves an inch they’re going to hear that he’s awake.

It eats at him though, as he crawls back in bed. What Bucky and Natasha would be talking about without him. What they might be saying about him. And why in the middle of the night when they had almost every morning alone together?

Then he realizes that the dark rings around Bucky’s eyes never went away. 

Steve spends most of the next day coming up with different strategies for forcing Bucky to get some fucking sleep . He could buy him a nicer pillow,  maybe a sleep mask and a noise machine. He could start going to bed earlier himself, Bucky might mimic the behavior. And he could turn off the Wi-Fi before he does.  Maybe he needs to remove the distractions.

But in the end, Steve abandons all planning and confronts the problem headfirst.

(In hindsight, this was inevitable from the moment he decided not to include Peggy in the strategizing process .)

“Is there something wrong with your bed?” Steve asks, setting down a plate of reheated potato casserole in front of Bucky. 

Bucky gives him a blank stare. 

“Or is it the room? Natasha was joking about you being claustrophobic, but if that’s actually the case you can take my bedroom and I’ll-“

This gets a reaction out of Bucky.  “I’m not kicking you out of your own goddamn bedroom and sticking you in a closet like you're Harry fucking Potter,” he says. “Jesus Christ,” he adds running a hand through his hair. He’s been growing it out since he got back. It’s . . . nice.

“Hey, it wouldn't be the first time I was in the closet,” Steve says, forcing a smile.

Bucky does not look amused.

“I’m serious, Buck. If you're not sleeping, we can work something out. My mom will still take you.”

Bucky sighs. “It’s got nothing to do with the room, Steve. It's just, nightmares and shit. It's fine. It’s nothing. I’m getting enough sleep.” 

Steve feels like he should say more, but Bucky turns the TV on, effectively conveying that the conversation is over.

Steve starts noticing other things after that. 

The circles under his eyes never go away. Neither does the tension in his shoulders. Bucky’s on edge. Jumpy. The microwave goes off Steve drops a book on the floor and it’s not a flinch. It ’s barely perceptible, but Bucky tenses. 

Then there’s the music. Before he  was deployed, Bucky liked to have music playing nonstop. Everything from pop to rock to rap to jazz. Steve discovered music he couldn’t have imagined existed just by being near Bucky. And if he wasn’t playing it, he was humming it, or singing under his breath, or whistling. He especially liked to whistle because Steve couldn’t and it bothered the hell out of him. 

But Steve can’t think of a time when Bucky’s put on music since he’s been home. And he’s definitely not singing. He doesn’t protest when Steve puts on music. Doesn’t protest anything Steve does, except for when he tries to get them to switch bedrooms again.

If Steve suggests a walk in the park, they go to the park.  If Steve reminds him museums are free the first Sunday of the month, Bucky spends the day looking at paintings with him . If Steve says “I’m gonna go get coffee, wanna come?” Bucky asks “Are you going to the atrociously hipster place?” but he goes anyway. 

As far as Steve can tell, Bucky’s not going out on his own. Not aside from his morning runs and mandatory trips to rehab. But he goes out with Steve, and he’s not really sure what to do with the information.

 

* * *

 

It’s a Saturday.  Steve’s trying to get a head-start on next week’s homework when Natasha appears behind him perched on the back of the couch.

“What about the girl in your accounting class? Laura something?”

Steve swears he only jumps a little. He hadn’t even heard her come in the room.  Natasha sneaking up on people was nothing new, but trying to set him up on dates was a hobby she had only picked up in the past few weeks. So far she’s suggested Karen with the student newspaper, Matt from the gym, and Claire the nursing student. 

 “Hello to you too,” Steve says, eyes not leaving his homework.

She nudges him with her foot. Hard. “Don’t ignore the question.”

“Are you referring to Lillian?” He knows exactly who she’s talking about. Lillian sits next to him in accounting, one of the classes he picked up with his new minor. She let him borrow her notes when he’d missed class. She even offered to help Steve study. Steve isn’t sure where Natasha learned that, but by this point in their friendship, he’s learned not to ask.

“Yeah, she’s cute,” Nat says. 

Lillian was short, with spiky pink hair. She had a lip piercing and a few tattoos. She didn’t look much like an accountant. “She’s not my type,” Steve says. He doesn’t know that even had a type, but he’s running out of reasons to turn Natasha’s suggestions down. 

“I thought bisexuals didn’t have types.”

Steve copies a line from his textbook into his notes.  Maybe if he only half listens to Natasha she’ll get bored and leave his love life alone. “We don’t have genders, that doesn’t mean we don’t have types,” he says.

He’s not sure that comes out right, but before he can clarify there’s the sound of a key turning in a lock.

Both their heads snap to the front to the apartment as Bucky steps through the door. He’s coming back from his morning run. His skin is gleaming with sweat, the collar of his shirt damp with it. He runs a hand through his hair, and his shirt rides up revealing a small strip of his toned stomach. 

 Steve drops the pencil he was holding.

“Hey,” Bucky says giving them a nod. 

Steve swallows. “How was the run?” 

He shrugs. “Oh, you know, one foot in front of the fucking other. Not much to report.” He grabs a water bottle from the fridge and chugs half of it in one swig. “I was gonna go to the grocery store later. Either of you need anything?”

Natasha informs him that they’re out of eggs, and Bucky excuses himself to shower. He’s barely out of the room before Nat’s attention is on Steve. He ignores her. He actually does need to finish his homework. 

“What about James?” Natasha asks, in the same nonchalant tone she used to talk about the eggs. 

Steve swallows. “Hmm? What about him?”

Natasha raises a brow.

Steve looks over his shoulder, making sure Bucky isn’t about to emerge from the bathroom. “We’re  just -” 

“Don’t give me the ‘just friends’ crap,” she interrupts him. “You are many things Steve Grant Rogers, but you have never once been subtle.”

Steve had wondered, during the years they were apart, if his feelings for Bucky were fading away. He thought that maybe it was just a weird childhood crush.  The kind you developed when you were figuring out your sexuality around when your male friend was outgrowing his awkward phase. Or when your best bud was also the only person that would give you the time of day.

It wasn’t like he stopped thinking about Bucky while he was gone. He didn’t care for him any less. But Steve has other friends now. He’s no longer perpetually single. He doesn’t _need_ Bucky anymore, at least not quite as desperately as he did before. But he’s still waiting for the childhood crush to go away.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder, but it made Steve’s heart more confused. 

Steve doesn’t know how to explain this to Natasha, even if she can read most of it on his face. “Even if I . . .” Steve trails off, still unable to admit it out loud. “It’s still not like that. _He’s_ not -“

Natasha cuts him off with a look this time. 

“Have you asked him that?”

Steve hadn’t asked him, and a part of him knew it was wrong to assume. But the larger part of him said that Bucky’s had plenty of opportunities to say something. Not least of which, when Steve sent himself into a panic attack coming out to Bucky when they were seventeen. 

Steve shakes his head. “We’ve known each other for years. If something was gonna to happen between us, it would’ve happened.” 

“Maybe, maybe not. People change, Rogers.” Nat nudges him again, gently this time. “You changed when you were in Europe. And he’s changed too.  Maybe it was never the right moment before.”

Steve doesn’t want to think about this — Bucky’s got enough to worry about without having to deal with his best friend’s pathetic crush — so he asks “Why are you so interested in my dating life  all of a sudden .”

Nat’s eyes flicker to the bathroom door, but just as quick they’re fixed on Steve. “It’s been what? Five months? Isn’t it time for you to get back on the horse?”

It was five months to the day on Thursday. Not that he’s counting.

“Feelings don’t have a timeline, Natasha,” he says, unable to help the edge that creeps into his voice. Because it was one thing if Natasha was trying to set him up for her own amusement. It’s another if she was meddling in his life because she thought he ought to. “I’ll date again when I’m ready. When I find the right person.”

“I’m not saying you need to get married or anything. A little fun won’t kill you.”

“What would you know about it?” he snaps. 

If Steve wasn’t as close to Natasha as she was, he would never have been able to parse out the emotions that pass across her face. It’s only there for an instant before she schools her face to neutral, but there’s an expression of pain and betrayal.

“Shit, Nat, That came out wrong” Steve grabs her hand. “I didn’t mean, because you’re ace, I just meant,” he sighs. “You don’t know Peggy.”

She gives him a small smile. “She seems like a helluva gal.” A half-joke to say _we’re still okay._

Steve lets out a breathy laugh. _Helluva gal doesn’t even cover it,_ he thinks. Steve’s got to have that dopey look on his face just from thinking about her. Ana called it his Heart Eyes.

The truth is, mixed up feelings for Bucky aside, he’s not sure he’s ready to move on from Peggy. Five months later and he hasn’t stopped thinking about her every damn day. He thinks of things he’d like to say to her. Things that would make her laugh, or that they could get angry about together. He misses the smile she would make when she was trying to conceal how pleased she felt about something. He misses the smell of her hair. Misses waking up next to her, he smooth skin pressed against his. 

Some nights he lies awake at night thinking about Ana and Edwin. How Ana had moved to another country to be with the man she loved. After only knowing him a month no less, a tenth of the time he had with Peggy. He wonders if he should have fought harder for them. If he should have made some dramatic gesture at the airport terminal like his life was straight out of a romcom.

But then he remembers that Peggy wouldn’t let any man fight for her. And that was one of the things he loved about her. If she thought that their breaking up was for the best, then it probably was.

Nat must see something in Steve’s expression shift because she puts on a smile and says.“Well if you’re not going to talk to Barnes, I really think you should reconsider calling Matt,” Nat says, her tone almost petulant. “He’s Catholic. You could bond over the guilt.”

 

* * *

 

Steve doesn’t call Matt. He does let Natasha convince him to go clubbing that night.

Steve’s not much of a dancer, but he enjoys spending the time with his friends. They go to a gay bar because Nat hates being hit on by sleazy guys and Steve and Sam don't mind. They’re both on the floor now, moving their hips and shoulders to the beat of the music. Steve’s at the bar waiting to order a drink, in no real hurry to rejoin them. 

Both of them, plus Bucky, had tried to teach Steve how to dance more times than he could count. ( _“_ _Try_ _bobbing your head, like this. No, not like that. You look like a chicken. Man, you are hopeless.”)_ But none of it helped. If he concentrated on moving his upper body, he wound up stepping on others’ feet. ( _Fucking hell, Steve._ _I said relax your shoulders, not bring all your damn weight down on my goddamn toes.”)_ And if he concentrated on his feet, the rest of his body just froze in place. ( _“That is atrocious, Rogers. If my posture looked like that the mistress would have held my head up by my hairs.”)_

No matter what they taught him, no matter how he tried, he didn't get any better. Dancing made him feel like he was outside his body. Like he didn’t fit in his own skin. 

In England, thankfully, no one made him dance.  Whether he was with Peggy and Howard and the Jarvises, or with Gabe and Morita and Dernier, everybody wanted to go to the pub. But in high school, Bucky _loved_ dancing. And he was good at it. Their junior year homecoming he danced with all the girls that didn’t have a date. They were practically lining up for it. Steve remembers feeling sick with jealousy watching them.

After that Bucky got a fake I.D. so he could go to the clubs.  For a time during that spring, he went out almost every weekend, blowing all his allowance on cover charges.

Steve wanted to invite Bucky to join them tonight. He wants to see him dance again, even if it was with some pretty woman he picked up at the bar. Wants to see him smile even when he doesn’t realize Steve is looking.

 

But Steve thought back on the past few weeks. How many times had he dragged Bucky out somewhere he didn’t want to go?

So he said, “I’m going to a club with Nat and Sam,” like it’s not a question.  “What are you doing tonight?” 

Bucky’s expression did a strange thing. “Okay -” He stopped himself. “I think I’m gonna stay home and get caught up on laundry.” 

“Okay,” Steve said. And he’s not disappointed, he’s not. Because Bucky is making choices for himself. And Steve can’t blame him for that. 

 

Steve wonders if the absence of his interest in dancing has anything to do with the arm. He wonders about the arm a lot. 

It’s not that he has a problem with it, it’s just that no one gave him a manual for what to do when your best friend becomes an amputee. He tries asking his mom about it. She’s seen patients like this at the hospital. She tells him not to make a big deal out of it, but Steve can’t help thinking it _is_ a big deal. If he ignores it, it’ll seem like he’s avoiding it.  

Steve’s thoughts are interrupted by a man stepping into his personal space.

“Hey,” the man says. 

“Hey.”

“Can I buy you a drink?” he asks.  Or Steve thinks he does, because he’s talking into his bad ear, which is just _great_ because it’s hard enough to hear in these places anyway.

The guy is cute. Lean and not too tall, with coiffed hair and nice brown eyes.  Steve searches the crowd for Natasha, because she has to be behind this somehow. But when he finds her on the dance floor, she’s lost in the music. Her whole body swaying in an ethereal way that shouldn’t fit with the hip-hop blaring through the club. 

Steve shakes his head. Whatever this guy’s looking for, Steve’s not going to be good company tonight.  “Thanks, but I’m here with my friends,” he says, and then because he doesn’t want to stand there, he makes his way to where he spotted Nat empty-handed.

“Well, well, look who decided to join us.” Sam’s face breaks into a huge grin when Steve meets them. 

Nat drapes one arm loosely around his shoulders, still swaying to the music. Steve does his best to mirror her movements. He remembers Peggy teaching him how to dodge a punch. How to weave back and forth, how to throw his weight around. 

“Look at you, Rogers,” Natasha teases. And almost like she reads his mind, she starts moving her feet in a push-pull. 

Steve’s still not sure this qualifies as dancing. It's certainly not  _good_ dancing. But it feels right in a way dancing never did before. He tries to give Natasha a spin, and she laughs at him, but she plays along. And he and Nat and Sam stay together on the dance floor all night long. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The kickboxing scene was inspired by [ this post that breaks down the similarities between Steve and Peggy’s fighting style.](http://airagorncharda.tumblr.com/post/113138274451/thefrogpresidentisnude-themarvelsofcomics)


	4. October 21, 2015 & November 25, 2017

**_21 October 2015 _ **

 

Muscles aching, Peggy shoves the heavy gym mat into its place in the storage closet. It reeks of a disgusting mix of sweat and the chemical cleaner she wiped it down with. 

One more to go before she can lock up and go home.  She always finishes her homework early on nights she teaches kickboxing, so she had nothing to do but put on her pyjamas and relax. Listen to some music or finally start the book she bought last weekend.  Maybe if Colleen is home they could break open a bottle of wine, but her job at the grocer’s usually kept her out even later than Peggy.

Peggy turns to retrieve the final gym mat and finds the door to the storage room blocked by the piece of equipment in question. She can only see the pale hands gripping the edge of the mat, but she knows who’s behind it.

“Where should I put it, Peggy?” Steve calls out.

Peggy points to the other mats and presses her body against the wall so he can manoeuvre the equipment into place. 

“You know you don’t need to help clean up.” Everyone else had no problem leaving as soon as she dismissed class.  “I am being paid to do this,” she says grabbing the other side of the mat and helping Steve hoist it on top of the others. 

 Steve leans against the pile of mats and shrugs with one shoulder as he catches his breath. 

 “S’no trouble.”

Peggy shakes her head. F ondly, in spite of herself. She’s come to expect this kind of behaviour from Steve. Holding the door open, picking something you dropped, staying after class to clean up. 

Anyone else and she would think they were suffering from an old-fashioned and misguided sense of chivalry. But Steve was like this with everyone: men, women, old, young.  And it isn’t like he's overwhelmingly polite either — he doesn’t hold back a smartarse comment if he thinks you deserve it, doesn’t mince words if he doesn’t like something — just kind.

“Is there anything else I can do?” 

“I only need to lock up,” she says, fishing through her gym bag for the keys. 

Steve hovers beside her. 

“Good lesson today.”

Peggy hums noncommittally. “Yes, I thought you would like the push kicks.” He certainly has the energy for them.

Steve makes no move to leave as she locks the door to the classroom, so Peggy returns the keys to her bag and waits for him to say what's on his mind.

“Have you started studying for the exam yet?” he asks.

Peggy raises a brow. The world politics test was over a week away. “I was going to start this weekend.”

Steve nods. “Yeah, I know. But our study abroad advisor was going on and on the other day. About how different testing is in Europe. He said most exchange students fail their first exam.” 

He pushes his hair away from his face, but a piece of fringe clings to his brow. Peggy resists the urge to brush it back for him. 

“I wouldn’t worry if I were you. You contribute to discussions every week. Go over the readings and you’ll be fine.”  Peggy has never found Phillip’s exams particularly difficult. Even accounting for differences in the American education system, she’s confident Steve will pass. 

She heaves her gym bag over her shoulder and would walk away if Steve didn’t look like he still has more to say. 

“It ’s just if I don’t get at least a B in all my classes I could lose my scholarships. And I, well,  I was wondering if you, maybe, wanted to study together?”

Peggy has been spending more and more time with Steve since his first kickboxing lesson.  Sometimes Ana invites him out to drink with them. Sometimes they find themselves sitting together at lunch so they can continue their class discussions . But Steve has never been the one to  initiate plans. 

Peggy’s not sure what gives it away, maybe the nervous way he’s wringing the bottom of his shirt, or the hopeful glint in his eyes, but she’s fairly certain this is his awkward attempt to ask her on a date.

She feels the corners of her mouth rise. 

“I’d love to.”

 

* * *

 

Peggy can’t even feel disappointed that her plans for a relaxing evening in were foiled. She agrees to meet at his dorm in an hour, giving her enough time to shower and put herself together again. 

There's no sense in dressing smart for a study date, but she does put on her favourite sweater.  The one that hugs her curves in all the right places, without actually revealing anything. She gathers her notebook and laptop, leaves a note for Colleen, and is out of her flat within the hour . 

Steve lives in a dorm on the south side of campus, close enough for Peggy to walk.  Instead of the exhaustion she usually feels after a workout, there’s a small spring in her step as she makes her way there.

Two men are sitting in the hall when she arrives, bent over a single laptop and chatting in . . . French, Peggy recognises. The scruffy-looking one looks up as she approaches. “Qui est la meuf?” he asks the other. 

Peggy stops in front of them. “Laquelle est la chambre de Steve?” she asks with faux politeness.  She could just look at the room numbers, but she finds a particular sort of pleasure in the stunned looks on their faces as they realise she understood them .

The black man, the more handsome of the two, Peggy thinks, points to the door behind her. “Uh, that one,” he sputters. 

They continue to gape at Peggy as she knocks on the door. And when Steve opens it, he does a double-take between Peggy and his hall mates.  She pretends to ignore the suggestive looks they’re giving Steve, and he slams the door shut behind her, ears turning pink . 

“I hope you didn’t have any trouble finding the place,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. Like Peggy, he’s showered, and he’s changed into a soft white t-shirt and dark jeans. Unlike most things he wears, they aren’t covered in paint. He’s barefoot, so Peggy kicks off her shoes as well. 

“Not at all, your friends in the hall were happy to help.” 

Steve’s blush deepens. “I hope they weren’t being rude or nothing. They like to tease, and well, they  probably weren’t expecting someone like you,” he stops, changes course. “Not that _you_ , uh, I mean me. It's me. I’m the last guy they would expect to have a girl over.” He cringes. “Not that that’s why you’re here, I  just mean,” he waves his hand  helplessly . 

Rather than take pity on him, Peggy lets her eyes explore the room. The bed is  neatly made with a navy blue duvet. He didn’t spare much room in his suitcase for decorations, but there are a few photos tacked to a cork board by his desk. 

There’s a picture of a blonde, middle-aged woman. Steve’s mother, she assumes. There are wrinkles around her eyes, but she’s still  clearly beautiful. The picture captures her mid-laugh. She wonders if Steve took it. 

Another photo shows Steve with his arms slung around two people around their age, a taller black man and a woman with short red hair and a wry smirk.

Steve looks younger in the third photo, maybe fifteen or sixteen. He’s getting a piggyback ride from another teenager with brown hair and a troublemaker smile.

There are a few books stacked on his desk. Most are textbooks, but there’s a well-worn copy of Steinbeck’s _Of Mice and Men._ There's also a sketchbook lying open on the desk, a profile outlined on the page. As soon as her eyes fall to it, Steve, who up until now hasn’t moved an inch from the door,  snatches it up. 

“I was, uh, doodling a bit while I was waiting for you,” he says, shoving the sketchbook into his bedside table drawer. 

“I’d love to see your work sometime. Ana tells me you’re quite talented,” Peggy says, sitting on the edge of his bed.

“Yeah, I’d love to show you.” Steve rubs his hands on his jeans. “Something that’s finished. That's  just a bunch of random sketches. Nothing special.”

The small room doesn’t have many options for seating, and Steve glances at his desk chair, before joining her on the bed.

“Do you have a piece that you're proudest of?” 

Steve’s eyes light up, and for the first time since she arrived in his room, he looks comfortable in his own skin. He describes a mural he painted at a community gym in Brooklyn .  “They didn’t have the money to pay a real artist, so I volunteered,” he says like it’s nothing. Like he didn’t donate hours and hours of his time to ensure that poor kids had a nice place to play. 

His hands fly as he explains the colours and design, the ideas he wanted to convey. Peggy discovers she loves hearing Steve talk about art. She's far from an expert, but he manages to not sound pretentious, even as he name-drops artists she’s never heard of.  

He didn’t dry his hair, and as he talks, she watches a drop of water fall from his fringe to right below his collarbone, then run down until it disappears beneath his shirt.

Steve hadn’t caught her attention when she first saw him in class. It was the way he spoke his mind that made an impression, not his appearance. But the more time she spends with him the more she finds herself admiring his beauty. 

There’s a gracefulness to the way he moves. Even when he’s nervous, a steadiness in his hands. He has lean muscle even on his small frame. She sees it at work every time he comes to kickboxing lessons.  And his eyes, bright and blue and  unfailingly earnest, framed by  impossibly long eyelashes . She thinks she could drown in those eyes.

Before she can overthink it, Peggy grabs his arm and leans in. She telegraphs her movement, the way that will get you punched in a fight, but she does it now to give him a chance to pull away. He doesn’t, and she presses her lips against his. 

It’s short and sweet, but it still sends a thrill of electricity through her body. As she pulls away, Steve’s eyes look glazed, almost confused. 

“I hope that was okay.” 

Steve clears his throat, “Yeah, it was _definitely_ okay.” His eyes dart to her lips, then back to her eyes. There’s a question there.

Peggy laughs softly and rests her forehead against his. “It was something I’ve been meaning to do.”

“Yeah,” Steve says, still sounding dazed. He slowly brings one of his hands to Peggy’s hair. “What were we talking about again?”

“You were telling me about your art.”

“Right,” Steve says, his fingers brushing against her scalp, and it feels _heavenly._ She has probably spent more time thinking about his hands than she should. Artist’s hands. They were strong and almost too broad for his thin arms. Calloused from hours gripping pencils and brushes. Almost certainly dexterous.  

“We were going to study for our world politics exam,” she says.

“Yeah,” he weaves his fingers through her curls, marveling as it runs through his hands.

Peggy tilts her head. “Or you could admit the studying was a ruse and we could snog instead.” 

Steve suddenly pulls his hand away. “Peggy, uh, you should probably know, I don’t exactly have a lot of, um, experience, you could say, and I -“ Peggy silences him by placing a finger on his lips.  

Peggy’s no artist, not even much of a photographer, but she wishes she could capture the look on Steve’s face. He’s flushed from his neck to the tips of his ears, going almost cross-eyed looking at her hand. It’s adorable.

She gives him a reassuring smile. “Steve, do you think I’m the kind of girl who puts out on a first date?”

“I . . . don’t know how to answer that in a way that’s not gonna get me punched.”

Peggy laughs as she says, “That’s  probably smart.” Then she moves her hand to the back of his neck and pulls him to her again.

 

* * *

 

 

_ 25 November 2017 _

 

The first time Angie reminds Peggy of Steve, it’s the accent. 

Peggy is no stranger to the American accent. She grew up hearing it in movies. She studied how to imitate it at MI6. And now she’s lived in New York for going on three months. 

Steve’s accent was a shifting thing.  It was only when he got worked up about something that it went from generic American to full-blown Brooklyn.

The first time she heard it come out was in class. He was angry about something,  probably directed at Alex Pierce.  Peggy had never understood before, when people said they found a certain accent attractive .  But she took a particular pleasure from bringing out Steve’s accent, not due to anger, but from another kind of worked up . 

Angie’s accent is a full-time affair. She can’t _not_ hear it. When she refills Peggy’s _cawfee,_ or she can’t _rememah_ what she _was gonna tell ya._

Their accents aren’t exactly the same; Steve was an Irish Catholic from Brooklyn while Angie  was raised in an Italian community in Jersey . But to Peggy’s ears, they’re close enough. 

One night a man walks into the restaurant with frosted tips and an orange tan, music blaring through his headphones for all the world to hear. And Angie turns to Peggy over her shoulder and says, “ _Pfft,_ can ya believe this guy?”

And it’s like Peggy’s mind is playing tricks on her. Because Angie is standing in front of her but the words coming out of her mouth could be Steve’s. 

 

She’s reminded of Steve another night when Peggy comes to the café a little earlier than usual. Angie is talking to an elderly woman, she must be in her nineties. She’s at the restaurant with a daughter or a nurse.  Angie’s must have been standing there awhile because the man at the next table over is trying to grab her attention and growing irritated . 

Angie gives him a shit-eating grin and holds up a finger as if to say “ _One minute,”_ then turns her attention back to the lady and asks another question, leaning on her chair to hear the answer.

Peggy thinks of a time they were leaving the rec club at the same time a water aerobics course was letting out. Steve was stuck holding the door open for a whole quarter of an hour as the seniors filed out, same big smile on his face.

Peggy asks Angie about it later. “Was that your grandmother?”

“Nana? No.” Angie shakes her head, her ponytail swinging  adorably. “My nana got knocked up at nineteen, so she’s a got a good twenty to thirty years on Miss Elsie. She’s  just an old lady that comes in here sometimes.” Angie looks at the woman’s table  fondly. 

“She’s a real spitfire, kinda like you English. And she used to be an actress, kinda like me. She traveled with the U.S.O. during World War II, and boy, does she have stories to tell.” Angie raises her eyebrows suggestively. “She claims she used to step out with Marlene Dietrich.” 

“You’re pulling my leg.”

Angie holds up her hands, “Only if she’s pulling mine."

 

Peggy notices little similarities after that.  The creases that form between their eyebrows when they pout, or how they always keep a pencil tucked behind their ears.

It’s not like they’re clones or anything. Steve never knew how to back down from a fight. Angie can diffuse any situation with a smile. Angie wants nothing more than to be on Broadway. Between his inability to lie and tendency to flounder whenever he’s put in the spotlight, Peggy can hardly imagine what Steve's career on stage would look like. 

It has to be some strange coping mechanism, she thinks. She’s lonely. So she’s seeing reminders of her ex-boyfriend everywhere. When she sees a public art installation or passes a group of students studying. It doesn’t help that she’s in Steve’s hometown. It’s like an itch that you can’t scratch. You tell yourself to ignore it, but it doesn’t make it go away.

 

One night, Howard calls her out of the blue, right as she’s walking into the L&L Café. And she hates to be the kind of person who takes a call in a restaurant, but she hasn’t heard from him in ages. 

“Peggy! I got great news,” Howard declares as soon as she answers. “I  just booked my ticket home for Christmas and I gotta see you.”

“Yes, Howard, hello to you too,” Peggy says flatly.

“Aw, come on, Peg. Don’t try to sound like you don’t miss me,” he says, and she can hear his smile. “I can’t believe Miss Union Jack’s been living in my hometown. New York, New York. You’re liking it there aren’t you?”

“It’s  perfectly lovely.”

“I got so many restaurants I want to show you. And bars, and well,  mostly bars. And clubs. There’s this place in Greenwich Village-”

“Before you get ahead of yourself,” Peggy cuts him off. “I don’t know how much time I’ll have off work.”

“Come on, they can’t be working you that hard over the holidays,” he insists. “Oh! I  just had a brilliant idea. You should come stay at my penthouse.”

“Howard,” Peggy warns.

“In a  purely friendly way. Gosh, Peg, get your mind out of the gutter. I know whatever they’re paying you it can’t be enough to afford a decent place in Manhattan. I’ve got like five or six spare bedrooms, you’d have no reason not enjoy the luxury while you can.”

“I’ll think about it,” Peggy admits, which in a way means Howard has already won. “If you do manage to drag me out drinking with you every night it might be smart of us to only need one taxi.”

“Now you’re talking. We’re gonna have a lot to squeeze in over  just a few days. Twenty-second to the twenty-seventh. After that, I’m joining the Jarvises for New Year’s. We’re going skiing in the Alps, so I’ll need you to help me brush up on my French.

“You know how to say ‘voulez-vous coucher avec moi?’ _”_ she says, effortlessly sliding into the other language.“What else do you need?”

“Very funny. You know,  I might want to order food while I’m there. Ask about their wine selection. Find the bathroom.”

“You know Jarvis will handle all that for you,” Peggy says, because Jarvis is incapable of _not_ taking care of his friends.

“Hey English!” Peggy looks up to see Angie standing in front of her table. “Oh sorry! I didn’t realise you were on the phone. Do you want your usual?”  

“Who’s that?” Howard asks as Peggy nods to Angie. “She sounds nice.”

Peggy nods and waits until Angie has stepped away to scowl into her phone. “Stay away.”

“Hey, I ’m just asking. That wasn’t the waitress you told Ana about, was it?”

“What? No. She told you that?” She only mentioned her to Ana in passing. _There’s this restaurant near my flat with a cute waitress and a good reuben, so I eat there a lot._

“You know Ana, she loves playing matchmaker. She’s found her soulmate. Now she wants the rest of the world to suffer with her. She’s bringing a friend for me to meet on the skiing trip, Mary or Marcia or something.”

“Now you know what it feels like.”

“Oh, that’s right. I forgot she was the one who got Steve to finally ask you out.”

"That’s putting it  generously.”

“How is Steve by the way?” Howards asks.

“He’s doing well. We spoke on the phone the other day," she says, as nonchalantly as she can manage. "He invited me to his mum’s for Thanksgiving.”

“That’ll be fun.” 

Peggy lets out a small, bitter laugh. “Unfortunately, I had to turn him down. I’ll be working.”

“Damn. They  really are keeping you busy. That’s too bad.” Howard says, then adds, “Hey, you should invite him to the penthouse too. We can drink spiked eggnog and make bad decisions. It’ll be  just like old times.”

Peggy sighs. “Not  just like. He’s seeing someone else now.”

“Really? I’m sorry, Peg,” he says, and Peggy can’t stand how his voice goes soft. All the usual quip taken out and replaced with sincerity. 

“No, don’t be,” she says. “I’m happy for him.  Truly .” And it is true, even if it sounds forced. She wants Steve to be happy.

“Alright then. More eggnog for us,” he says, and she’s grateful. “Hey, I gotta go now, but I’ll text you the details. Let me know as soon as you know your work schedule.”

Peggy says her goodbyes and not longer after Angie’s back at the table setting down a mugh of hot coffee. She’s giving Peggy a strange look as she sets down the mug.

“Who was that?” she teases. “I know it wasn’t someone from work because you were smiling way too much.”

“No, it was an old friend from uni.”

“Well, that’s nice,” Angie says. “What else is new? Are you doing anything special for Thanksgiving?”

“I’m afraid I’ll be spending most of my day in the office.” 

“Aw no,” she whines. “They’re making you come in on Thanksgiving? Even this place is gonna  be closed .”

“Why is everyone acting like that’s such a tragedy?” Peggy asks. Steve, Howard, now Angie all had the same reaction. The bureau needed someone on call, and Peggy volunteered so the people with families could spend time with them. “I’m more than willing to be paid time-and-a-half for working on a holiday I don’t even celebrate.” 

Angie looks at her like she’s crazy. “You don’t?”

“It’s an American holiday. And Canadian, I’m told, but they celebrate in October.”

“Huh, I’d never thought of that before.” Angie puzzles this for a moment before her attention returns to Peggy. “What about this weekend? You got any exciting plans?”

Peggy can’t remember the last time she had exciting plans that didn’t involve work. “Not really.  Maybe I’ll start the book I’ve been meaning to read.”

“Well, I tell ya what. Eva and Sarah couldn’t go home either, so on Saturday, we’re having a Friendsgiving. All the fixings of Turkey Day except without having to put up with your racist uncle. You should come.”

Peggy shakes her head. “I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

“It’s not an intrusion if I’m inviting you.” Angie nudges her shoulder. “Come on, English, you work too hard. One day of fun ain’t gonna kill you.” 

_It’s not me I’m worried about,_ Peggy thinks.

“I don’t know, Angie. I appreciate the offer, but . . .” Peggy’s voice trails off because she can’t think of a good excuse not to go.  _‘I already care about you too much and couldn’t live with myself if I put you in danger’_ would be  terribly overwrought . But ’ _I don’t want to’_ would be  patently false.

“Am I missing something here?" Angie asks. "You’re not working, you don’t have plans, so I’m thinking  maybe it’s me?” 

And she knows she shouldn’t, but Peggy can’t stand the look of hurt on Angie’s face, so she says, “Alright, what time does it start.”

 

* * *

 

Peggy insists on bringing a plate, despite the fact she doesn’t have a kitchen and has never eaten a Thanksgiving meal before . The internet tells her that corn is  often  served, so she buys a few bags of the microwavable kind. 

She finds Angie’s apartment building  easily enough, but she hesitates outside. It’s not too late to make an excuse She could say an emergency came up at work. 

It was one thing to  politely chat with Angie while she was on the clock, it was another to see her outside of work, to  be invited to her home . This was crossing into new territory, and Peggy doesn't have proper intel, can't know what to expect.

But even for someone as independent-minded as Peggy, the thought of going home to her pathetic excuse of a flat and eating the whole bowl of corn by herself is  incredibly depressing. 

So she buzzes Angie’s apartment.  

“Come on up. Apartment 3C, door should be open.”

When Peggy opens the door to 3C she  is greeted by the sight of long, toned legs and a bare midriff. 

“Sorry.  Just a second,” the woman, who is definitely not Angie, says, revealing even more skin as she reaches for something out of sight.  In the next moment, a blonde woman jumps off the chair she was standing on and smooths down her sweater, covering her stomach but still leaving miles of legs exposed beneath her cut-off shorts .

“Er, hello,” Peggy says, at a loss for once.  Before she can asses whether she’s at the wrong apartment and decide how to handle the situation, Angie appears in the doorway behind her. A huge smile lights up her face. “I was beginning to worry you weren’t gonna show. Sarah, you weren’t accosting my guest, were you?”

“I didn’t hear her coming," Sarah says. "I had to finish hangin’ up the garland.”

Angie looks up at the doorframe with a disgusted look on her face. “I thought we said no Christmas decorations until December.”

“Nope,” the other woman says, popping the P. “I said y’all didn’t have to put up _your_ Christmas decorations until December,” she waves the hammer she’s holding in a wild circle to gesture to the apartment . “But I can put mine up whenever it pleases me. Thanksgiving is  officially past. Ergo, Christmastime.”

Angie brings her hand to her temple. “Peggy, this is Sarah. Sarah, Peggy.” 

Sarah turns back to Peggy and her eyes go wide like she’s noticing her for the first time. “This is the girl from the restaurant?” She asks, studying Peggy up and down. “I can see what you mean.”

Angie gives Sarah a look that says _cut it out._ Then she waves her hand at Peggy. “Come meet the rest of the girls.”

Despite residing in an older building, Angie’s flat is nice.  Well lit and spacious, at least by New York standards, she’s surprised they can afford it, even with their combined incomes.  Most of the furniture has the modern, utilitarian quality of Ikea, but the walls more than make up for their lack of personality. 

There are playbills and framed records, several of them signed, a pride flag, a tapestry of a watercolour world map, posters of old Hollywood scarlets, Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe and even one of Rosie the Riveter . 

Underneath the “We can do it” they've taped photos and newspaper clippings. Even an essay that earned an A grade, like proud parents post on the refrigerator.  Peggy realises this the way these women, each trying to make a name for themselves in their respective careers, are encouraging each other. 

Peggy misses that support network, because if her boss isn’t going to recognise her accomplishments, it would be nice to at least hear it from a friend. She’s often marveled at how Angie can stay so unwaveringly optimistic no matter how many failed auditions she attends. but she imagines the little sticky notes that say “Break a leg, Angie” have to help.  

Curled up on the couch, sipping a cup of coffee and scribbling in a journal, is a tan woman with long black hair. Eva, Angie informs Peggy. Which means the tall, mousy woman in the kitchen chopping vegetables must be Mary.

“Why is the T.V. on mute?  We’re supposed to be watching the parade,” Angie asks the room, grabbing the remote from behind Eva’s head and plopping down on the couch next to her. “Have you ever seen the Macy’s parade, Peggy?”

“Only in Miracle on 34th Street,” she says.  The crowds packed on sixth avenue and oversized balloons she sees on the screen seem reminiscent of the old film. 

Seeing no other seating options, Peggy sits on the couch between Angie and Eva. Eva curls her feet even closer to her body to offer her more room, but she is still forced to sit close enough to Angie for their shoulders to press against each other.  

“Every year I look forward to the parade and every year I only get an hour in before my cousins outvote me and put on the football game instead,” Angie says. “I tried going in person two years ago. Let me tell you, not as much fun as watching it on T.V.”

“It’s cold,” Eva explains, wrapping a blanket around her shoulders as if the idea of the biting winter air was enough to make her cold from inside the cozy apartment. 

“Eva’s from Puerto Rico. She’s always freezing. We were like this far from Al Roker,” Angie says, holding her hands a meter apart. “And all she could say was ‘My nose is cold. My hands are cold. My coffee’s cold,’” Angie imitates. 

Sarah sits down on the floor in front of the couch, “Guys, shut up. Leslie Odom Jr. is singing.”  On the television, a handsome man croons while Big Bird and other colourful characters dance around him .  Peggy reminds herself that on Thursday the president pardoned a bird, so this isn’t the strangest American tradition. 

“God, listening to his voice is like taking a bath in melted chocolate,” Sarah says. 

“Sticky?” Angie asks.

“Sexy,” Sarah  practically moans.

Eva looks up from her journal. “Is he still with Hamilton, Ange?”

“No he left with Lin and Phillipa Soo last summer,” Angie says with a small frown. “Do you like Hamilton, Peggy?”

“Careful how you answer, or Angie might break into song,” Sarah says. Angie  playfully kicks the back of her head.

Peggy smiles at Angie. “At the risk of incurring a musical wrath, I have to admit I’m not familiar with the show. I’ve heard it’s quite good,” she says. Sousa took his girlfriend a few weeks ago, and he’d been humming the songs ever since.

“Yeah, try phenomenal.”

“You’ve seen it?”

Angie scoffs. “Are you kidding? These are the hardest tickets to get in town. My buddy Anthony, his boyfriend is in the ensemble, and even he couldn’t get me a ticket. Eva got to meet Lin Manual Miranda, though. At this charity event for Hurricane Maria.”

“He was  really nice,” she offers, before burying her nose back in her journal. 

Angie bolts up.“Oh, the Rockettes are up next. I _loved_ the Rockettes as a little girl.”

“ I wonder why,” Sarah says  flatly . Angie throws a pillow at her. 

Mary calls out from the kitchen, “Don’t mind me. You just keep watching T.V. I’ll be in here cooking a Thanksgiving feast.” She blows a hair out of her face as she continues frantically mashing potatoes. “I thought Sarah was going to be doing half the work.” 

“I did.  I made green bean casserole, gravy, chess pie, and the macaroni and cheese is in the oven,” she says counting the items on her fingers. “Don’t be jelly I did all my work a day in advance.” 

“Mary didn’t have that option. She got home from Boston this morning,” Eva points out, eyes not leaving her journal.

“I came back a day early to celebrate with my _friends._ And this is how they treat me.”

“If it’s an extra pair of hands you need, I’d be happy to help," Peggy says.

 

Despite Angie’s protests that she’s their guests, Peggy winds up in the kitchen. And Angie misses the Rockettes to join her.  

Peggy has never had much talent in the kitchen, but she can do as she’s told. Take the rolls out of the oven. Stir the soup. Set the table.  Peggy’s shining moment comes when Angie and Mary are both incapable of opening the jar of cranberry sauce, and she removes the lid with ease.She’s not sure it would have been a huge loss if they had to go without cranberry sauce, but Angie looks at her like she saved the day. 

Eventually, the five of them gather around a table meant for four with a dinner made for at least a dozen. Eva stays wrapped in her blanket as she moves from the couch to refill her coffee mug to the table. 

“What do you want to drink, Peggy?” Sarah asks. “We’ve got apple cider, tea, coke, wine?”

“Tea sounds lovely.” 

Sarah pulls a pitcher out of the fridge and pours two glasses of some brown liquid that is ice cold and definitely not what Peggy was expecting. She sets a glass in front of Peggy and keeps one for herself. Peggy  cautiously takes a sip and has to restrain herself from spitting it out. 

“It’s a little sweet," she says, which may be the understatement of the century.

“Well, yeah, it’s sweet tea,” Sarah says as if that explains the atrocity she just drank. 

Mary rolls her eyes. “It’s a weird Southern thing. Like caring about college football, or not knowing the difference between pen and pin.”

As they fill their plates, Angie taps her knife against her glass to get everybody's attention. Mary and Sarah exchange a look that says _Here we go._

“I thought that while we eat we could go around the table and say what we’re thankful for.” She turns to her right. “Mary, do you want to start?”

 Mary looks like she'd rather enjoy the meal she cooked, but she's not going to start a fight over it. “Okay, um, I’m thankful I passed Fed Courts,” she says with a shrug.  

“And?” Angie prompts. “I know you have more good news than that.”

Mary blushes a little and says, “Yeah, I’m also thankful I'm going to be  interning with Goodwin, Kurtzberg, and Holliway next semester.” 

The reactions around the table tell Peggy how big a deal this is. Sarah actually gets out of her seat to give Mary a hug. Mary tries to shove her off, but Peggy can tell she's pleased.

“Okay, Eva’s turn.”

“Um, I’m thankful for having steady work at the recording studio. I’m thankful for my cousin Luis for introducing me to the right people, and for being good family.” She wraps the blanket tighter around her body. Her voice is a little quieter when she adds,“And I’m thankful nobody I know  was hurt in the hurricane.” 

Sarah gives her arm a squeeze. 

“Is it my turn?  Let’s see,” Sarah rubs her hand on her chin in an exaggerated expression of contemplation. “I’m thankful for getting some editorial experience this year, even if they still haven’t given me a byline. I’m thankful for Black Friday sales, for cheap wine. I’m thankful for my mom and dad and baby brothers. I’m so excited I get to see them in less than a month.” She looks around the table. “And I’m thankful for you losers. You’re the best roommates a girl could ask for.”

The table ‘ _aws’ and ‘me toos’_ Sarah’s declaration, and before she’s had time to think about it all eyes are on Peggy.  

“Do I have to follow that?” she says with a laugh. “Er, well, I guess I’m thankful I moved to New York.  My job could have assigned me to a lot worse places, even if I don’t get on with everybody at the office. ”

“What do you do again, Peggy?” Mary asks. 

“I work for AT&T.” 

“Yeah, but what do you actually do?” Angie asks, raising her eyebrows. 

“I’m a project manager.  I identify potential markets and partner with local stakeholders to develop new investments,” Peggy says as  smoothly as she can . When in doubt, confuse them with jargon. But Angie doesn’t seem to be buying it. 

“And where did they have you stationed before New York?”

“London.”

Sensing some of the tension, Eva asks, “Was there anything else you were thankful for Peggy?”

Peggy opens her mouth to speak but has to think a moment before responding. “My mum, I supposed. We’ve grown a lot closer of the past year. We talk on the phone almost every week, and I’m grateful for it. Even if she does keep asking me when I’m going to find a boyfriend.”

Sarah grabs Peggy’s shoulder. “You’re preaching to the choir, sister. My mom keeps asking when I’m going to find a _husband._ I keep telling her that she’s going to be waiting a long time,” she says, drawing out the long. 

Angie shakes her head. “Not as long as my parents.” 

“What about you Mary? Have you told your dad about Cameron yet?” Sarah asks, teasing smile on her face.

Mary crosses her arms. “How many times do I have to tell you we’re not dating.”

“Right,” Sarah says, like she’s not agreeing at all. “You're just studying buddies. Who meet at his apartment. And spend the night.” 

“You try going to law school and tell me you don’t pull a few all-nighters.”

Sarah looks like she has a retort, but before she can get it out Peggy interjects. “ I believe you.”

“You do?” Mary asks sounding surprised.

“Yes, my last year of undergrad there were several nights I had to pull all-nighters at my friend Steve’s dorm.”  Peggy pauses before adding, “Of course, when I came home with love bites on my neck, my flatmate began to question the efficiency of my study methods.”

Mary turns even redder than she did when she told them about the internship and instinctively brings a hand to her neck . Sarah doubles over,  practically howling with laughter. Angie is laughing too, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. And Eva, Peggy notices, isn’t laughing at all. She’s quiet, Peggy's noticed, but she’s been especially withdrawn since she brought up her mother.

“Of course, I keep reminding Mum that I’m as likely to bring home a new girlfriend as a new boyfriend, but she keeps forgetting. You know how some people lose their memory in their old age,” she says, voice dripping with sarcasm. 

Eva gives her a sympathetic look, which Peggy tries to return, but more importantly, Angie’s megawatt smile has returned.

“Okay, your mom  intentionally forgetting like that, it sounds rough. But have you considered the opposite extreme? Because I’m known throughout my family as the gay cousin.  Every Sunday I take the train home, I go to mass, my nana cooks lunch. The whole family —aunts, uncles, cousins, in-laws — all under one roof . _Every week_. They know about my auditions, my roommates, the crazies I meet on the subway. You’d think there would be other things to say about me, but every time they introduce me to somebody new it’s ‘This is Angie. She’s gay.’”

“Hey, gay Angie, you never said what you were thankful for,” Sarah says.

Angie throws her arms in the air like she’s admitting defeat. “That was my gimmick and now you use it against me? Fine, I’m thankful for my big, dumb family. And I’m thankful for my smaller, dumber family here in this apartment.”

And though she wouldn’t go so far to call them family, Peggy feels grateful for the group sitting around the table too.

She ends up consuming more food than should be humanly possible, and Angie insists she stays to watch the rest of the Macy’s parade while it digests. But then there’s a Harry Potter marathon on, so she stays for a few more hours. And it’s only when she looks outside and realises it’s long been dark that she pulls herself away.

The girls send her home with leftovers. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are not familiar with a push kick and you would like to be I highly recommend checking out [ this youtube channel. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHg7LBvusOg)
> 
> “Qui est la meuf?” roughly translates to “Who’s the chick?” (if you’re American) or “Who’s the bird?” (if you’re English) or any other informal, potentially derogatory term for women. “Laquelle est la chambre de Steve?” translates to “Which room is Steve’s?” At least that’s what I was gong for. Like Steve, my high school French really isn’t what I would like it to be, so if you speak French and know a better translation please let me know. Oh, and “Voulez-vous couchez avec moi?” infamously means “Do you want to sleep with me?”
> 
> Before anyone from Brooklyn/New Jersey/New York, comes at me for my description of Steve/Angie’s accents, I’m from the South and to me, all North Eastern accents sound the same, as I imagine they would to an English person. I did a lot of research to try to pinpoint Angie’s accent, but everything I read said that differences in New York and northern Jersey accents have more to do with differences in class and ethnicity than geography.
> 
> ALSO, imagine my pleasant surprise when I was trying to research WWII U.S.O. performers who were also (probably) Lady Loving Ladies, and found I had my choice of Marlene Dietrich, Tallulah Bankhead OR Barbara Stanwyck. It makes me reevaluate what Steve’s time on the bond circuit was like. 
> 
> Okay, that’s a lot of notes. If you’re still up for more of my thoughts [you can find me on Tumblr ](http://padmedala.tumblr.com/) or just leave a comment (I will love you forever).


	5. November 14, 2015 & October 31, 2016

** _ 14 November 2015 _ **

 

“That bad huh?” 

“That’s not what I said.”

“Well, it kinda sounds like that’s what you’re saying,” Steve says, sounding a bit petulant.

"On the contrary, it was rather good,” Peggy says, her finger tracing a line down his chest. “For your first time,” she adds, and he can feel her smiling against his chest. He looks down, expecting to see she's teasing him, but instead of a smirk, there’s a relaxed, blissful look on her face.

She meets his eyes.  His expression must betray the insecurity he feels because she says, “Honestly, Steve, it’s nothing to be ashamed about. Virginity is an archaic, heterosexist concept anyway.”

He almost laughs. “Really? ‘Cause I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be that coherent right about now. An archaic, hetero-something concept? What does that even mean?”

She does laugh, and she rolls over so her chin is resting near his heart. “ Maybe , you need a little more practice,” she says. “You are a fast learner.”

Steve definitely wouldn’t say no to more _practice_ with Peggy _._ “Especially when I have such a great teacher,” he says.

“Well, don’t make me sound like I’m the world’s leading expert.” She pokes him in the ribs. 

“I- I didn’t mean — I’m not calling you a slut or anything. I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with having many sexual partners. Iwould never call any woman a slut. Or a man. Or any person of a non-binary gender.” He’s rambling now, probably blushing too. Before he can stop himself he says, “I just meant, before you I’d only ever kissed one other person. And that barely even counts. So whatever level of experience you have is more than me.” 

Peggy studies him for a beat, then says,“You still don’t have a bloody clue how to talk to women do you?”

Steve shakes his head, laughing a little at himself. _You’d think lying naked in bed with one would give me a confidence boost,_ he thinks.

“Have you  truly only kissed one other person?” She sounds disbelieving. He should have expected the question since he brought it up, but it doesn’t make it any less embarrassing. 

“Women aren’t exactly lining up to date a guy they might step on.”

“You sell yourself too short,” she says with a kiss to his shoulder. “I have it on good authority that some women find you _very_ attractive.”

He hates that there’s still a part of him, a part that's growing smaller each day he spends with Peggy, that tells him that can't be true. Everything he’s experienced before he met her tells him otherwise. 

“When we were teenagers, Bucky hit his growth spurt early on. By fourteen, fifteen, he was tall and handsome, and all the girls at our school had a thing for him. So he was always going on dates. Sometimes it seemed like there was a different girl each week.” Steve isn’t sure what’s compelling him to share this.  Apparently, his post-orgasmic brain doesn't know when to shut up. 

But he doesn’t mind Peggy knowing, so he continues. “He could see that I’m wasn’t getting asked on any dates, and I definitely wasn’t doing the asking.  Eventually, he gets the idea to try and set me up. So he’d plan double dates with the girls' friends. We’d go to the movies, or out to eat. Didn’t matter where we went, it never went well. As soon as the girls saw me, they always seemed disappointed I didn’t look more like Bucky. Or that they couldn’t have  been paired with him.” 

“Are you sure you aren’t projecting?” Peggy asks.

He shushes her with a good-natured swat, “Don’t spoil the ending.”

She returns his swat, and he continues, “Most of the girls were nice about it. But I never felt like trying anything with someone who was only spending time with me to be polite." He doesn't mention the girl who wasn't so nice about it. Bucky got so mad on Steve’s behalf, he never spoke to her or her friend again.

“After this happened a few times, one night, we went back to my apartment, and I told him to stop bothering. No more double dates” 

As Steve talks, he stares at the ceiling rather than look at Peggy. But he keeps running his hands through her hair, and he can feel her paying attention to the story. “He kept trying to change my mind. He said that I  just needed some practice. So I could be more confident around the girls. And then, we’re sitting on the bunk beds in my room having this argument, and he kisses me.“

If Steve had ever tried to imagine a situation where Bucky kissed him — which he hadn’t, at least not before that moment — he would have imagined a quick press of Bucky’s lips against his .  Just enough to prove his point. So for the first few moments, Steve had sat there in shock, waiting for Bucky to pull away. 

But then Bucky started moving. 

He put his hands up to either side of Steve’s face and slid his lips against Steve's. He did his best to keep up. Moving his hands from Bucky’s chest, to his shoulders, to his hair, unsure where they should rest. 

When Bucky pulled away, Steve pulled away too, even though every cell in his body was screaming to pull him back in. It had turned him on far more than a single kiss should. But he was sixteen and it was the most action he had seen, so he couldn’t  really blame his body.

“And that’s how I realized I was bi.” Steve finishes the story with a flourish. He looks down and sees Peggy biting her lip to stifle a laugh. 

“That was your first kiss?” She sounds incredulous. “Serving as your best friend’s experiment?”

“I was a willing test subject,” he says shrugging his shoulders as best he can with her weight on top of him. It had embarrassed him for years. While everyone around him at college was getting laid, he only had the one kiss. Even that felt like it didn’t count when nothing came out of it. They never even talked about it. 

He tried dating on his own, or thought about it at least. But he was still awkward around girls. And the only guys he knew that were into guys were only interested in fooling around.  The thought of making out with someone  just to say he had seemed even more pathetic than never having the experience at all .

Then Peggy came along and changed all that. She isn’t with him out of pity. And when she kisses him she makes it clear she wants to. Sometimes  just the way she looks at him is enough to get his heart racing. 

And he wants to be with her. Not because it feels nice to  be wanted , but because she’s Peggy _._ She’s gorgeous and intelligent and uncompromising. She can speak four languages and knock a grown man out with a single punch.  And as much as he likes kissing her, and the way she looks at him like he’s the best thing she’s seen, as much as he wants more opportunities to _practice_ with her _,_ more than that he  just wants to get to know her better . Wants her to trust him the way he trusts her. 

So he asks, “What about you?” wrapping his arm around her and pulling her even closer against him.

“Are you asking about my first kiss or how I realized I’m bisexual?”

“Either. Both.” He moves the hand that was in her hair to graze her cheek. “I want to know everything about you.” And he can hear it in his voice. It sounds an awful lot like _I love you._ They haven’t said it out loud yet, but he’s thought it enough. _I’m in love with Peggy Carter._

She contemplates the question for a moment. “ I think a part of me always knew. I remember when I was a little girl playing make-believe, I always wanted to be the knight rescuing the princess. Never the princess  being rescued .”

Steve snorts. “Anyone who thinks you need rescuing has got another thing coming.”  He’s been to enough kickboxing lessons to know anybody that went against Peggy was going to have their ass handed to them.

Peggy smiles in a way that doesn't reach her eyes. “My parents are very traditional though, so it was awhile before I came out. My first kiss was in secondary school, with a boy named Fred. He was an absolute plonker, but my mother adored him, so I dated him for three years.”

It’s hard for Steve to imagine Peggy sticking around with some guy that didn’t deserve her, especially for so long. The Peggy he knows is nothing if not sure of herself. But nobody’s the best version of themselves in high school, he supposes.

“I didn’t have my first girlfriend until university. Her name was Lorraine. She was fun, but a tad too dramatic. You know, sort of manipulative. I’ve dated here and there since then, but I’ve been to busy for anything serious."

“What about you and Stark,” Steve asks. 

“Me and Stark?” 

“The way he talks I thought you two,” Steve’s voice trails off as he sees the look of disgust on Peggy’s face. “No?”

“I can assure you Stark and I have never, and will never be, romantically or sexually involved. What has he been telling you?” she asks, starting to sound angry. 

“Nothing, nothing. I must have misunderstood what he said.” Steve tries to cover for his friend, but Peggy is glaring at him. She has to know he’s not telling the full truth, because he’s shit at lying. “He  just , um, took it upon himself to offer me some, uh, tips. That he implied  were based on first-hand experience.”

Peggy’s eyes go from accusing to murderous. She sits up and looks like she ’s seriously considering finding Howard and ripping him a new one right then. 

The last thing Steve wants is for her to leave this bed, so he puts his hands on her hips and tries to coax her back down. “Come on, Peggy, he was just saying that stuff to tease me. He didn’t mean to disrespect you. You can teach him a lesson later.”

“Don’t think I won’t,” Peggy says, but she lets him pull her back to his side. Her expression goes from murderous to grumpy. “If he was so eager to teach you  maybe _he_ should be the one here with you.”

Steve groans, burying his face in her shoulder. “Why’d you have to plant that image in my mind?” He kisses her shoulder. “I’d much rather.” He plants another one closer to her neck. “Be here.” He goes for the spot underneath her jaw that made her squirm earlier and hears the slightest hitch in her breath. “With you,” he finishes before kissing her on the mouth.  

He might be ready for his next lesson sooner rather than later.

* * *

 

 

 ****** _ 31 October 2016 _ **

 

“You’re not wearing a costume?”

Bucky doesn’t bother to look up from where he’s sprawled across his bed. 

“Didn’t have time to go shopping.” 

Steve crosses his arms. “We both know that’s crap.” 

Bucky stopped going on his morning runs about a week ago. And skips his physical therapy sessions half the time. He can’t start his work-study until December, and no one wants to hire him for a few months. He’s got nothing but time on his hands. 

“Didn’t feel like dressing up.”

Steve leans against the threshold to Bucky’s room. “You used to love dressing up. Remember when you spent a month working on a Buzz Lightyear costume? And I was Woody?”

“Yeah, when we were kids.”

They were thirteen and fourteen at the time. Steve could argue whether that counts as kids. A few adults had even told them they were too old to be trick-or-treating.

“Well, everybody else will  be dressed up.” Natasha, and Steve wasn’t sure if he should be surprised by this or not, gets really into Halloween. She threatened bodily harm to anyone who came to the party without a costume. 

Steve had gone thrift shopping with Maria and scrapped together an Indiana Jones ensemble. Maria had found an old aviators cap and announced her intention to go as Amelia Earhart. Everyone else’s costume would be a surprise to Steve. Natasha had insisted on getting ready at the loft Clint and Sam share to avoid spoiling the surprise.

Steve’s ready to go, eager to see who everyone chose. But Bucky’s sour mood is starting to dampen his own. Steve been wanting to introduce Bucky to his college friends for years. But now, looking at Bucky lying in a grumpy heap on his bed, Steve fears what kind of impression he’ll make.

But he needs to get out of the apartment. Steve doesn’t need a psychology degree to know Bucky’s dealing with PTSD or depression or something.  Maybe both. Steve had tried to talk to Sam about it.

 

_“Since we met, Bucky and I have been inseparable. And now . . .” Steve’s voice trailed off._

_“I get it. You want to be there for him, and you feel like you can’t be because you don’t know what he’s going through,” Sam said, reading him like a book as usual. "But you gotta trust me, Steve, being there as a friend is the best thing you can do. You just got to give it time. Everybody has to adjust in their own way.” _

_“I know,” Steve sighed. “I_ know.  _Just_ _promise me you’ll try to talk to him.”_

 

Of all his friends, Sam had the best chance of understanding what Bucky was going through. He served a tour with the air force, right out of high school like Bucky. He’s been back for over two years now though.

He’s mentioned Sam to Bucky a few times, dropping hints. If Bucky didn’t want to open up to Steve, he could understand, but he needs to talk to somebody.

“We can pull something together with what you have here.”  Steve crosses across Bucky’s room, a distance of only a few feet, to where his clothes are hanging in the makeshift closet. “Why don’t you put on your suit and say you’re James Bond? Two years ago, Sam and I wore suits and sunglasses and said we were the Men in Black.”

“Last time I checked, James Bond had two arms,” Bucky says.

Steve ducks his head out of the clothes to study Bucky where he’s flung across the bed. Limbs loose, arm resting over his eyes, blocking out Steve and the world. 

“Is that what this is about? Cause that leaves us with a lot of options,” Steve says. “Both Skywalkers lost a hand. Or we could do like a gender-swapped Furiosa. I wished we talked about this sooner, I could have made something in my sculpture class.”

“Steve, stop,” Bucky cut him off, sitting up now. “I don’t need to be the goddamn poster boy for amputees. I  just don’t want to spend the night stuck in a fucking suit I bought it when I was eighteen to wear to a funeral.” 

Steve gives him an apologetic look. Bucky returns with a stare. They did this sometimes, playing out an entire argument in silence. Saved time and breath, which given Steve’s asthma could be a real concern. The contest end like most of them do. Bucky shakes his head and gives Steve a softer look that says, _Go do what you were going to do anyway._ _Just don’t_ _expect me to be happy about it._

Steve pulls a red and black flannel of its hanger and throws it at Bucky. “Put that on. With jeans,” he commands, then goes to the kitchen to find the final piece. 

Bucky joins him a moment later, dressed according to instruction.

“What am I supposed to be exactly?”

Steve sets a roll of Brawny paper towels, still in its packaging, on the counter in front of him. 

“Very clever.”

“I figured the whole, 'I haven’t paid attention to my personal hygiene in weeks' look actually works when you’re going for a lumberjack,” Steve says, waving his hands in Bucky’s general direction.

“I practice personal hygiene, thank you very fucking much. I  just haven’t shaved.”

“Or gotten a haircut,” Steve counters.

“I thought you liked my hair this way,” Bucky says with a smirk. In that second he’s his old flirtatious self again. 

Steve doesn’t have a smart response to that because, well, he does like his hair at its new length. It's getting long enough for him to pull the front back into a little ponytail. Steve reminds himself to close his mouth. 

“Do you mind helping me roll up my sleeve?” Bucky nods to his left side where the fabric hangs limp. The doctors gave him a prosthetic, the cheapest that crummy insurance could buy. It was plastic and stiff and didn’t match his skin tone. Bucky wears it as rarely as possible.

Steve does as he's asked, trying not to admire the way the flannel stretches tight across his chest as he rolls the fabric. Bucky was always in good shape, but the military training left him with muscles Steve didn’t know existed. It makes him want Bucky to serve as the life model for one of his drawing classes.  Maybe a private lesson.

Steve pulls away as soon as the sleeve  is folded to  just below the scar

“Let’s go. We’re already going to be late as it is.”

 

* * *

Sam and Clint live on the top floor of a small apartment building in Bed-Stuy. When Steve knocks, Natasha opens the door, dressed in a black crop turtleneck and cargo pants. 

“Kim Possible?” Steve asks.

“Clint’s dressed as Ron.”  She says with a huge grin, nodding over her shoulder to where Clint sits on the couch in a similar black top and cargo getup.

“That’s actually kind of perfect.”

She gets Clint’s attention and signs, “He likes our costume.” 

With his hearing aids, Clint can usually get by when you're looking at him.  But in a crowded room like this, Michael Jackson blaring through Sam's speakers, even Steve has a hard time hearing.

He’s been gradually picking up A.S.L. since he met Clint, so he signs “Very cool” with a big smile to backup Nat’s statement. 

She leads them into the loft where the party is already in full swing.  He sees Scott Lang (in a Han Solo costume) trying to recreate the Thriller choreography while his girlfriend Hope (as Leia) looks on unimpressed.

There are more people there than Steve expected, some he doesn’t even recognize. As he grabs a beer from the cooler, a man dressed as a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle introduces himself as Peter. He’s there with a woman who went all out on her witch makeup, trying ( unsuccessfully ) to convince her to dance with him.

As he makes the rounds, Bucky hovers by his shoulder. He helps himself to a drink, but it doesn’t seem to help him relax. He’s wound like a coil on a mousetrap, ready to snap at the next person who tries to talk to him. 

When Pepper, who's donning in Holyhead Harpy Quidditch robes, politely asks who he’s supposed to be, he holds up the paper towels without a word.

They haven’t been there half an hour before Steve is pulling him aside. “We can leave in a little bit if you’re not having fun. I  just wanted you to meet Sam. Nat said he was out picking up more drinks, but he should be back soon.”

“It’s fine Steve. I’m having a good time,” he says. Then adds, with a forced laugh, “Jesus, if I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were trying to set me up.”

Steve’s brows scrunch together. “With Natasha?” For all the interest she took in Steve’s love life, he thinks she’d murder him in his sleep if he tried to meddle in hers. If she even wants one. “I guess, you can ask her, if you want? I mean, she’s gorgeous, obviously, but-“

“Not Natasha. This other guy. Sam?” He's wearing his old cocky smirk, but he’s refusing to make eye contact with Steve. 

_Is he saying what_ _I think he’s_ _saying?_ Steve thinks. As far as he knows, Bucky only ever dated women. But a part of him always wondered, in the way that you do when you’re secretly in love with your best friend.  His memory hangs on to every time Bucky mentioned another guy’s appearance, any suggestion that his Kinsey score might be higher than zero.

The way Bucky’s eye flit around the room betrays his nervousness. _Like he’s looking for escape routes._ So he says the first positive thing that pops it his head. 

“I mean, Sam is hot too.” Which isn’t a lie. Sam has nice cheekbones and even nicer shoulders.  Steve always assumed Sam is straight, but Steve is also questioning every assumption he ever made about someone’s sexuality.

Bucky heaves a long sigh. The kind he always did when he knew Steve was about to do something stupid, and he was going to get dragged into it.

“Let’s hope we get along then. I haven’t gotten laid in fucking forever.”

Steve checks his hip as they walk back to the party. A little physical contact to say convey that they’re still okay. 

“We should form a club. Did I tell you that Peggy’s bi too?”  Steve asks, and he’s reminded of Peggy insisting, sometime after he told her the story of his first kiss, that Bucky was queer and just not ready to come out yet.

_“Straight boys don’t decide out of the blue to kiss their same-gendered friends, Steve.”_

“You must have mentioned in one of the dozens of letters you sent extolling the innumerable virtues of Peggy fucking Carter .”

He sounds annoyed. Steve supposes it must have gotten boring, hearing about the same person over and over again. Though Steve never minded when Bucky talked about the guys in his unit. Steve could remind him that Peggy was the reason he resumed writing letters to him, but he resists.

“Do I talk about her too much?” he asks.

Bucky shrugs, “She was your first love, Stevie. It’s only understandable.”

It’s such a sappy sentiment coming from Bucky, Steve has to choke back a laugh. “What would you know about it? I don’t remember you falling in love with any of the girls you dated.”

Bucky looks away. Before he can come up with an answer, the door to the apartment swings open. 

“Everyone, relax. I have returned,” Sam shouts, lifting up his arms full of brown paper bags. “And I brought booze.” Val follows him through the door with a giant keg thrown over her shoulders. They’re both wearing the signature blue and white of the Water Tribe. Sam as Sokka and Val as Korra.

He shuts off the music so he can have everybody’s attention. “Alright listen, we got plenty to drink, so drink up. But if we run out, someone else is gonna have to go to the liquor store, because I’m not going out into the crazy again. 

“Help yourself to candy and snacks. And get your pizza orders to Clint in the next thirty minutes, or you’re gonna be stuck with whatever’s left over. And I saw someone asked for pineapple and olives, so you do not want to let that happen.”

Sam walks over to the entertainment system where there are two Jack-o-Lantern shaped plastic buckets. “In this bucket,” he holds up the orange one. “Put your votes for who has the best costume. There’s no prize, other than bragging rights, so don’t cheat.”

Steve looks around the room and knows he’s going to cast his vote for Wanda.  She must have spent hours sewing her Nightmare Before Christmas costume, and the makeup alone made her an eerie but beautiful Sally.

“And in the purple one put your votes for what movie we’re gonna put on later. Nothing scary, cause some of us don’t like that shit.”

“Then what are options?” Natasha calls out. 

“Really, Romanoff? You’re wanna make me read them out loud when they’re sitting right here?” Sam says, staring Nat down. 

She leans back with a closed-mouth smile, and Sam holds up DVD cases as he reads them off.  “Alright we’ve got Halloweentown, the original Ghostbusters, lesbian Ghostbusters, Clue the movie, because Barton insisted-”

“Fuck you, Sam. Clue is a cinematic masterpiece,” Clint says.

“Yeah, whatever, don’t vote for Clue. And last but definitely not least, Hocus Pocus. Anybody else have anything to say before I put the music back on?”

Val somehow manages to stand up on the kitchen counter without spilling a drop of her drink.  “If any of you are up to getting your ass kicked in beer pong, meet me at the kitchen table,” she says, full of bravado, before falling off the counter.

Steve moves to make sure she’s okay, but she pulls herself up before he can get to her. 

“You.” She points to Steve. “You want to play? Find a partner. Let’s go.”

The music is back on, and Steve isn’t eager to join the rest of the party doing the Time Warp again, so he figures _why not?_

He looks over his shoulder, but Bucky isn’t there. Steve scans the room and finds him in the kitchen, talking to Sam. He’s not about to interrupt the conversation he’s been trying to arrange for weeks. 

Nat is on the couch talking to Bruce, wearing a lab coat and a wig in a half-assed attempt to look like Albert Einstein. He’s been petting Clint’s dog since he arrived. 

Wanda somehow senses Steve’s struggle because she’s at his side asking, “Need a partner?”

Steve narrows his eyes at her. “How old are you again?” 

She crosses her arms. “Come on, Steve, don’t choose now to be a Goody Two-shoes.”

Steve’s always felt protective of Wanda, even if she's only a year younger than him, but he’s not about to make a fuss about her drinking.

Val has already set up the table and is explaining the rules to Thor, the Norwegian exchange student who’s built like a tank. He’s wearing an eyepatch and a bandana, though he looks like he’s not sure why. Some American customs are lost on him. Steve hopes this will make him bad at beer pong, but looking at the size of his biceps he doubts it. 

In the end, they play two games and lose two games. Steve is a good deal drunker than he was when he started. Val looks disappointed she’s not more drunk. 

He finds Bucky standing against the wall, observing the party with Nat. As Steve approaches, she gives him a nod a goes to join Clint, who is stuffing the purple pumpkin with ballots. 

“Bucky,” Steve pulls his sleeve to get his attention. “Buck. Buck-o. Buchananan.” 

Bucky raises his eyebrows. “Yes, drunk Steve?”

Steve makes a face. “I’m not that drunk.”

“That is exactly what a drunk person would say.” 

“Shut up. I had something to tell you,” Steve says. 

Bucky looks at him expectantly. He has really pretty eyes. Blue-grey, like the sky before a storm . . . or like the tile in his mom's bathroom. 

“And that was?” Bucky asks when the pause goes on for way too long.

“Oh,” Steve remembers he was saying something. “Val’s going to join the club too.”

“What club?" Bucky asks. "The bi club?”

“Bingo/” Steve pokes him on his nose. “Or should I say bi-ngo,” he says, mispronouncing the first syllable.

“You should definitely not say that.” 

Steve puts his back to the wall too, leaning against Bucky a little. He always feels touch-starved when he drinks, willing to do just about anything for a good cuddle. That has to be one of the things he missed most about being in a relationship. He always had a go-to cuddler. But Buck's the next best thing. They've known each other too long to be weird about causal touches.  Maybe it should feel weird now, giver their earlier conversation, but the touch feels as good as it always does.

“She was telling me about her ex-girlfriend.  Just mentioned it casually. Even though we  barely know each other.”

Bucky leans up a little to look at Steve. “Are you mad at me for not telling you?”

Steve has to think about it. He doesn’t feel angry, but even he can admit that was a petty thing to say. 

There’s another pause before he answers. 

“Not mad,” he says. “It’s your right to decide when you want to come out. And how. And to who. And I get that it’s hard. I’m  just . . .” He rubs the heel of his palm against his eyes. “Confused. I guess.”

“I didn’t want you to think I was jumping on the bandwagon. Or fuck, making fun of you. Or some shit like that.”

"It's not like there's a quota on how many people can be bi," Steve says, reassuring. But as he processes what Bucky said, it’s his turn to pull away from the wall and look up at Bucky. “Wait. You knew? Back then, when I came out to you?”

Bucky shakes his head. “It ain’t that simple, Steve. Self-denial is a powerful fucking thing.”

“Yeah,” Steve says, letting his skull fall back against the wall. Even though he’s not really sure he understands what he means. For Steve, it had been pretty clear from the moment Bucky kissed him how he felt.  The only question had been if he still liked girls, and thirty seconds spent reflecting on his crush on Emma Watson made that pretty clear.

Coming out to other people was scary, he got that. It took him a month to tell his mom, another year to tell Bucky. But coming out to himself had never been a problem.

He rests his head against Bucky’s shoulder. His brain feels fuzzy. He’s too drunk to be having these serious thoughts. 

“Do you want to dance?” Steve asks suddenly.

Bucky looks at him like he just suggested they go skinny dipping. Or rob a bank. Definitely something illegal.  Steve starts waving his arms and rotating his hip to demonstrate that his proposition is perfectly harmless. “Come on, Buck. Monster mash with me.”

“Oh god, you’re even drunker than I thought. Come on, we need to get you home.” Bucky says, pinning his arms to his side to stop the dancing.

"Noooo," Steve whines, even as Bucky is guiding him toward the door. 

“You said we could leave when I want, and I _want_ to not have to deal with you hungover in the morning.”

Steve wants to protest, wants to at least say goodbye to his friends, but the room _is_ spinning a little. So he lets Bucky guide him to the door. Lets him get them home safe, and tuck him into bed with a bottle of water and an Advil within reach. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Peggy having an ex-girlfriend named Lorraine was inspired [ by this post on Tumblr.](http://crazyintheeast.tumblr.com/post/119340390470/lets-talk-about-peggy-carter-and-private-lorraine) I highly encourage you to headcanon it. 
> 
> I agonized for a long time on everybody’s costumes (especially being unable to have anybody dress as superheroes) but it was also really fun. 
> 
> If you have thoughts and/or feelings about these characters please leave a comment or [ find me on Tumblr .](http://padmedala.tumblr.com/)


	6. December 21, 2015 & December 15, 2017

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning this chapter is a little more intense? than the last few. We’re still headed for a happy ending, but it’s not all fluff and witty banter for the next few chapters.

**_ 21 December 2015 _ **

As Christmas grows closer and closer, Steve grows more and more homesick. 

He doesn’t say as much, but Peggy can tell. 

He spends more time on video calls with his mother. And when they hang up, he’s withdrawn for a few hours. He’ll put on a smile, but Peggy can tell he’s not _there._

She notices him filling his sketchbooks with images of New York at Christmastime, drawn from memory. The tree at Rockefeller, Central Park blanketed with snow, children peering into department store windows. The sketches are like looking at a Bing Crosby song, saccharine and indulgent in a way Steve's work normally wasn’t.

Ana and Edwin leave for Hungary the first weekend of December, so she can be with her family for Hanukkah. Stark travels back to America not long after. Steve looked into buying a plane ticket, but he couldn’t justify spending the money only to be home for a few days. 

So Peggy does her best to make London feel like home.

She takes him ice skating at Somerset House, early on, before the crowds are too overwhelming. They glide around the rink, hands intertwined through their gloves, laughing at each other over every stumble and slip. On their way back to campus, they pass under an archway decorated with mistletoe. It distracts them for a few minutes, before they decide kissing would be much better in the comfort of one of their beds.

The next weekend she takes him to the Southbank winter market. They walk along the Thames, browsing the booths for gifts Steve could send his friends. And when not even the mulled wine can keep them warm, they go back to his dorm. They put Miracle of Thirty-Fourth Street on the laptop between them. He tells her about how Doris Walker reminds him of his own overworked single mother as they hold each other close.

It takes more work to persuade Steve to spend the holiday at her parent’s with her. 

“You should be with your family,” he protests.

“I _will_ be with my family,” Peggy says. “And you’ll be there too. You think you’re being a burden, but trust me, I will be grateful to have a buffer between me and my mother.”

Eventually, he agrees. 

It’s half an hour by train to Hampstead Heath Station, where her father will pick them up. Five minutes into the ride, Steve starts fidgeting. The armrest, the zip of his jacket, the snap on her purse, his hands refuse to stay still. He doesn’t even seem aware he’s doing it, so Peggy tries to ignore it. 

Ten minutes later his knee starts bouncing.

Peggy rips her earbuds out. “Is there something weighing on your mind, Steve?”

Steve’s eyes widen. “What?” 

Peggy gives him _a_ _look._

Steve ducks his head. “I guess, I’m a little nervous about meeting your parents. I’ve never had to do _this_ before,” he says waving his hands.

“Are you imagining they’ll chase you off the front porch with a shotgun?”

Steve laughs. “Maybe sit me down and threaten me?”

“I assure you, you have nothing to be worried about,” Peggy says. “You don’t smoke or have tattoos. You don’t support the wrong football club. I’d say try not to bring up politics, but I doubt I could stop you.” 

Peggy doesn’t hesitate to reassure Steve, but a part of her wonders if she should be more nervous herself. She hasn’t brought anyone home to meet her parents since Fred. Hasn’t been close enough to anybody. 

“Besides, you don’t need their approval,” she adds. “Nothing they think or say will change how I feel about you.” 

“They’re going to know you could do better than me,” he says, dejected. “I’ve seen pictures of your ex-boyfriend. And your ex-girlfriend. They’re going to take one look at me and-“

“Steve, do shut up,” Peggy interjects. “My last boyfriend was a wanker.” She grabs the sides of his face with her hands and pulls him towards her until their foreheads touch. “You’re ten times the man he was. If my parents can’t see that — _anyone_ who can’t see that, up to and including yourself, is a  fool.”

She kisses him on the cheek, for good measure, and he gives her a big dopey grin. “Thanks, Peggy.”

“Don’t mention it,” she says. “Also, you might want to wipe that lipstick off your cheek before we arrive.”

 

Peggy’s father is waiting for them at the station when they arrive. He greets her with a tight hug and a “Happy Christmas, Pegs.” He shakes Steve’s hand and offers a “Nice to meet you, son.” Steve, accustomed to American cars, almost tries to climb in the driver’s seat, which they tease him about all the way to the house. 

The home of Harrison and Amanda Carter is a Victorian semidetached, with a gate in the front and a garden in the back. Peggy's mother is fussing over her before she can walk through the door. 

“Margaret dear, oh I can’t say how good it is to have you home with us. Do you need help with your bags? Harry, help them with their bags.”

“We can carry them on our own, Mum. It’s not that much. Dad, don’t worry about it.”

“Wasn’t worrying,” he says, handing Steve his suitcase and slamming the boot shut.

“I don’t know why you don’t let your father help you,” Amanda tuts. “Still, it is good to see you again. You simply don’t visit enough. Did you cut your hair? I think I liked it better longer. I do wish you would consult me before you make these kinds of decisions.”

Peggy takes a deep breath and searches for the patience to put up with her mother through Boxing Day. She meets Steve’s eye to silently say, _‘Do you see what I put up with?’_

“And this must be Steven.” Her mum claps his hands between yours. “We are so sorry you weren’t able to be home this Christmas, but we are _so_ glad to have you with us.”

“Thank you, it’s very generous of you to invite me,” Steve says, putting on an uncharacteristicly formal tone.

“Nonsense,” she says, swatting Steve’s arms. “Margaret never lets us meet her friends. You have to tell us all about yourself, she told us you were an artist?” She says the word 'artist' the way some might say 'sewage maintenance personnel.'

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And what do you want to do with that?” Amanda asks, leading them into the house. Harry has already made himself comfortable in front of the telly. The Arsenal match is on, so he’ll be entertained for a while.

“Well, I’m still trying to figure that out,” Steve admits sheepishly. “We can’t all have it figured out like Peggy.”

“Yes, she does seem to have a plan in mind,” Amanda says with pursed lips.

Not wanting to rehash old arguments surrounding, Peggy interjects, “Steve, let me show you where you can drop your bags.”

 

Peggy leads Steve to her old bedroom and drops the suitcases and the foot of the bed. Steve's eyes travel across the room with a mix of curiosity and awe. She lived here over the summer, so it’s not a perfect replica of her childhood, but her old school uniforms still hang in the wardrobe. There are awards from martial arts competitions, old French textbooks, and plenty of photos featuring Peggy in her brace-faced, pre-pubescent glory. 

Steve’s take in all of it, jaw going a little slack, but he pauses in front of a framed picture on the wall above her desk. 

“Who is this?” he asks. 

Peggy doesn’t need to look over his shoulder to know which photo he’s talking about. It’s the one they took of after his promotion. He’s wearing his new captain’s uniform and a small smile, not quite enough to show his dimples. 

“My brother, Michael,” she says. 

“You never told me he served in the military.”

“You never asked,” Peggy offers by way of explanation, hoping against reason that could be the end of the conversation. But Steve turns to face her, brows furrowed.

“You never asked about Bucky. I told you about him because he’s important to me,” Steve says. “I know being open with your emotions is a novel concept to the English, but I am your boyfriend, you could have told me something about him.” He runs his hands through his hair and gives an exasperated sigh. “I mean, am I about to meet him? Is he gonna be home for Christmas?” 

“He’s dead,” she says bluntly. “Shot down in Afghanistan, two years ago." Not long after that photo was taken.

In an instant, Steve’s expression goes from anger to anguish. All the tension in his shoulders evaporates, and he’s pulling her into a hug. She wishes he wasn’t, because that's what it takes for tears to spring into her eyes. 

“Oh, Peggy, I’m so sorry,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper. She clutches at his back and buries her face in his next. He brings a hand to her hair. “I’m sorry. God, I feel like such an asshole right now.”

She shakes her head, staining his shirt with tears. “No, don’t. I should have said something. I- I don’t enjoy talking about it. We were, he was my best friend,” she says, voice breaking. 

“I wish I could have met him,” he says. “I bet he could have told me all kinds of embarrassing stories about you.”

Peggy sounds a little hysteric as her sobs turn to laughter. “I think he would have liked you,” she says. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Peggy pulls away a little, just far enough to meet Steve’s eyes. “He hated Fred. Even while we were dating, they never got on. And when I broke up with him, he didn’t take it well, called me a bitch and a slag to anyone who would listen. You know boys and their fragile egos. Michael wanted to punch him into next week.” 

Steve runs his thumb across Peggy’s cheek, brushing away stray tears. “Sounds like my kind of guy.”

“Yes, you would have taken the more immediate approach. I convinced him to wait,” Peggy says. “And he helped me wrap Fred’s car in cling film, so he couldn’t open any of the doors. And we filled the whole thing with bits of styrofoam so that when he finally could open it, the foam avalanched on top of him. He was picking it out of his car for weeks.”

It feels good to share the memory with Steve. Her father never talks about Michael. And with her mother, it’s always about what could have been, never what they had. Peggy expects Steve to laugh at the story, but instead, he’s regarding her with a strange expression on his face.

“What?” she asks, rubbing under her eyes. “Do I have mascara all over my face?”

“I love you,” Steve says. He looks like he did after she kissed him: a little dazed, a little scared, completely earnest.

And if this is a strange moment for a love confession, Peggy doesn’t care. Without hesitation, she says, “I love you too.”

* * *

 

** _ 15 December 2017 _ **

It’s in early December, after she’s been with the agency for months, that they finally, _finally,_ give Peggy some real assignments. Apparently, there’s pressure from the suits at the top to find some answers before the holidays, and it leaves Peggy and everyone at the bureau working eighty-plus-hour weeks.

It’s rather spectacular timing, because since Thanksgiving her personal life is also as busy as it’s been since university. Angie’s flatmates must have taken a liking to Peggy, because Sarah asked her out for drinks, Eva invited her to the hotel lounge where’s she performs on Tuesday nights, and Mary has been begging her to come over and distract her from studying for her finals.  

She has an open invitation to pop over for dinner at the apartment whenever she pleases. She gave them her phone number (well, one of her numbers. The burner she keeps for personal use only), and they’ve added her to a group chat. She learns more than she needed to know about who’s hair is clogging the shower drain and who’s turn it is to clean it. But she is able to participate in the bribery and blackmailing that goes into deciding movie nights.

Peggy spends time with them as often as she can. But with the ungodly amount of hours she’s working, it’s not that often. 

She’s been assigned to a team tasked with monitoring a potential asset, the son of Russia real-estate mogul. This involves a twenty-four-seven stakeout, and more often than not, she and Sousa are stuck with the night shift. The man fancies himself an amateur DJ, so her nights mostly involve listening to shoddy techno music and keeping detailed notes on the kinds of women he likes to take home. Because when it’s three a.m. and the target is mashed, that’s the only information they’ll find that could be useful for making contact.

Peggy doesn’t complain about it (at least out loud). This _is_ what she wanted after all. Long nights in the field are better than days that feel like an eternity behind a desk.

But she now has a newfound appreciation for what Angie goes through, working the night shift at the restaurant and still going to auditions during the day. Peggy’s sleep cycle has been completely wrecked. She lies awake at night, unable to sleep, thoughts churning through the investigation. The next time Angie sees her, she comments on Peggy’s haggard appearance. She brushes it off as a side effect of the holiday rush. 

Angie doesn’t seem to buy it.

She does, however, do an even better job than usual at ensuring Peggy’s coffee mug never goes empty, and Peggy thinks she might actually be a guardian angel.

 

On Peggy’s first day off in over a week, Angie is there to ensure she enjoys it. It’s a cold, clear night, and they’re wandering around Harlem. Angie distracts Peggy from work with animated retellings of her Christmas shopping misadventures. She started a fight over the last pair of gloves in the shop she wanted to give to her mother. 

125th Street is aglow with star-shaped lights strung from one side of the road to the other. Somewhere nearby there are carollers singing. “Steve told me there was nothing like Christmas in New York,” Peggy remarks.

Angie studies her out of the corner of her eye. “Steve’s your ex?” she asks. 

Peggy hums in confirmation. 

“English, if I weren’t afraid of being on the receiving end of your patented glare, I’d say you were still carrying the torch for this guy.”

Peggy could deny it, but she promised herself to lie to Angie only when necessary. This doesn’t meet the national-security-threat standards of her other secrets, so she doesn’t say anything.

“If he’s in New York, why don’t you reach out to him?” Angie asks, nudging her with her elbow.

“We keep in touch,” Peggy shrugs. “But he has a boyfriend now. And I have no interest in trying to shove myself between them.”

“That’s too bad,” Angie says. It doesn’t sound quite as genuine as when she told Howard the same news. 

Peggy shakes her head, “It wouldn’t have worked out between us anyway.”

“Why not? No,” Angie puts her hands up as if to stop herself. “Let me guess. You don’t do relationships? You’re married to your work? You can’t let yourself be happy because of something tragic that happened in your past?” Angie’s voice grows more melodramatic with each explanation. By the last one, she throws herself at Peggy in a mock faint. 

Peggy catches her with ease and sets her upright again. “You’ve been putting a lot of thought towards my love life, have you?”

Angie gives Peggy an exasperated look. “Come on, English. I’ve been flirting’ with you for months now, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“I . . . noticed,” Peggy says. 

So they’re talking about this now. It’s probably for the best. Peggy shouldn’t keep stringing her along. But it was nice to pretend for a while, to enjoy the flirting and the suggestive glances and the fondness while it lasted.

“So you weren’t planning on doing anything about it.” Angie shoves her hands in her coat pockets and refuses to make eye-contact with Peggy. “That’s great for a girl’s ego, you know?”

This is the part Peggy’s been avoiding. Angie’s looking away, and she’s damn good at hiding her emotions when she wants to, but Peggy knows she’s hurt, which is the last thing Peggy wanted. She needs Angie to know she did nothing wrong. “Angie, it’s not like that. You’re-“ she starts to say.

“Right,” she interrupts Peggy. “It’s not me, it’s you. It’s fine, Peggy. I know a brush off when I see it.”

Her posture goes stiff. She starts walking a little faster too. Not like she’s trying to get away, just enough to force Peggy to speed up her pace to keep up.

“Angie, I truly am sorry.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” she says, all of the humour taken out of your voice.

Peggy wants to say more, something to make Angie understand, but before she can, a person in the corner of her eye catches her attention. A man walking behind them by about ten meters. That in itself is not remarkable. There are dozens of shoppers rushing past, zipping from one department store to another. But this man was walking behind them three blocks ago.

“Shite,” Peggy curses under her breath. She pulls Angie to the side like they’re studying the nearest store’s window. Angie issues a noise of protest but lets herself be dragged where Peggy wants her. From the new angle, she can study the man without being obvious.

He’s about six foot, heavy build. Dark hair, thick brows. She catches a glimpse of a tattoo on his neck, a tentacle peeking out from his scarf. _Russian mafia,_ Peggy deduces. 

“Angie,” she grabs her arm and pulls her closer without thinking, “There’s a man following us.”

Angie, to her credit, does not immediately turn her head to look. 

“A man following us?

“I know this will sound mad, but I need you to trust me. If I can’t shake him he could be dangerous, so we’ll have to split up. When I say, we’ll keep walking straight. At the next intersection-” As she begins to formulate a plan out loud, Peggy scans the reflection in the window for other operatives. “Oh Bloody Nora.”

_Jerome Zandow._ Her brain provides the information as if she has a criminal databased stored up there. She ran into him while she worked undercover in Moscow. He’s a high-ranking enforcer with the Russian mafia, and he’s watching them from across the street.

“New plan,” Peggy says, linking her arm through Angie’s and continuing down the street away from Zandow and the other operative. She’s careful to keep their speed at a normal pace.

“So we’re being followed?” Angie asks. 

“Unfortunately.” She checks the reflection again and sees the man with the tattoo is closing in on them.

“And you’re trying to shake them?” 

“Obviously,” Peggy says, turning the corner onto one of the less crowded side streets.

“So you need a distraction?”

Peggy’s not sure what kind of a distraction would cause the operatives to lose their focus on their target. What she does need is a way to ensure they follow her so Angie can get away safely. “That would help, but-”

“We should make out,” Angie interrupts.

Peggy almost stops in her tracks. She can't say she hasn't imagined it. “How would that help exactly?” 

“It’s what they always do in the movies,” Angie says. “They start making out and the bad guys run right pass.”

Internally, Peggy curses James Bond and Jason Bourne and any Hollywood stooge who gave the world unrealistic expectations for what a job as an intelligence agent entails. “Angie, I think you might not appreciate the gravity of this situation.”

“Alright, I have another idea. What do these guys look like?”

Peggy describes them to her.

“Give me your coat,” Angie says, already pulling off her own. 

Peggy risks glancing behind her. The Russians haven’t rounded the corner yet. She removes her coat as Angie instructs, bracing herself against the freezing winter air. “What exactly are you suggesting?”

“Just trust me, English,” Angie says, shoving her blue padded jacket into Peggy’s arms. “And know you owe me one.” 

Angie dons Peggy’s grey peacoat and pulls a folder of headshots out of her purse. She plants herself on the pavement, and Peggy slows down, but Angie waves her arms to shoo her. “Go on, I’ll slow them down long enough for you to get a head start.”

Peggy regrets leaving Angie as soon as she’s crossed the street. She’s the trained operative, why would she leave Angie to confront these dangerous men? And giving her Peggy’s coat had put a target on her back. Peggy pivots on the spot to go back and rejoin Angie. 

But before she can she sees Angie standing right in front of Zandow. Across the noise of the street, she can barely discern what she’s saying.“Sir, do you have a moment to learn how you could save the environment,” she asks, waving her folder around like it’s a clipboard. “Sir, all I’m asking for is five minutes of your time. Signing this petition could save a life.”

With disgust, Zandow tries to move around her, but Angie sidesteps to stay in front of him. “Sir, did you know there are currently a dozen shelters in the City alone that euthanise the very animals they’re supposed to protect. Think about it, innocent little puppies, forced into overcrowded cages, only to be killed before they’ve had a chance to live,” she says, the sound of tears creeping into her voice. 

Peggy’s fear is momentarily transformed to awe, as she watches Zandow is overcome with a mix of contempt and confusion at Angie’s performance. She kind of wants to stay and watch the show. But Angie’s doing this so Peggy can shake the tail and squandering the opportunity could put them both in danger. So she walks away.

Walks, not runs, which would only draw attention to herself, but she switches direction every block, takes off Angie’s coat and puts it back on again, using every trick she learned in her MI6 training. The whole time she’s thinking of Angie, who had no such training, sick with worry imagining the worst possible scenarios. 

As soon as she feels confident she’s clear, she follows protocol and calls the office emergency line. They tell her to come in and file a full report. So much for enjoying her day off. 

As soon as they hang up, she is dialing Angie’s number.

“Please tell me you’re safe.” It comes out in a rush. 

“I’m fine. After about fifty seconds listening to me ramble they stormed off. I hope it was enough time for you to break away.”

“Yes, you did wonderfully. But you _need_ to ensure no one is following you before you go home.”

“The two guys you told me about disappeared. But I still took two different subways back to the café. I was going to hide out here for a while just in case.”

“Call me if you so much as suspect a chance of danger, _please_ ,” Peggy begs. “I’m so sorry, Angie, for all of this. The last thing I wanted was to drag you into this.”

Peggy can feel her exasperation through the phone when Angie says, “You ever gonna tell me what _this_ is.”

Peggy sighs, “I can’t.”

Angie starts to protest, but Peggy adds, “I mean, I can't now. Not over the phone. But I promise I _will_ explain.”

“I’m holding you to that, English,” she says, a little sharply. But there’s a smile in her voice, a smugness too, when Angie adds, “I knew you didn’t work for AT&T.”


	7. January 11, 2016 & April 8, 2017

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like the last chapter, this one is a little more serious/angsty. I have updated the tags so please read through them if you think you might be triggered by some content. Nothing is graphic, but if you’re worried you can skip to the second part.

****** _ 11 January 2016 _ **

 

Steve is grateful that Dr. Erskine convinced him to study abroad. He has made new friends, seen sites he thought only existed in the movies, and met the woman of his dreams. A woman, who against all odds, loves him too. A woman who spent the night at his dorm and woke him up this morning with . . . well, if he’s being honest, Peggy is the main reason Steve believes studying abroad was a smart choice.

But despite the personal reasons to be glad he took Erskine's advice,Steve is no closer to figuring out what he wants to do with his life.

When it is time to register for his second semester, he stares  blankly at the course catalog. He signs up for another art class because Ana will be in it. And another political science course because Peggy will be there. He even adds a hospitality management course because Jarvis is taking it.

Steve feels as lost as ever.

Peggy tells him that he’s being dramatic. That plenty of people don’t know what they want to do with their life at the age of twenty. But she’s been prepping her application for MI6, so Steve doesn't feel that reassured.

It’s easier to talk to Ana about it. They’re both still trying to figure their lives out, but she has the opposite problem. Steve doesn’t know what he wants. Ana wants everything.

Ana wants to be a fashion designer, or a model, and she also wants to teach primary school. She wants to travel and  maybe start a blog, or write a novel, but she doesn’t want to stray too far from Edwin.

Steve checks his watch. She should be in class by now. He looks around the classroom, but Ana is nowhere to  be seen .

She isn’t there when the professor walks in. And she’s still not there when he finishes lecturing and gives the class a drawing assignment.

Steve pulls out his phone and sends Ana a quick “ _You ok?”_

She  just overslept, he tries to tell himself. But he knows that Edwin fixes them breakfast every morning before his own classes. He would wake her up if she slept through her alarm.

Half an hour later, his phone finally buzzes. 

“ _Yes.”_

_“_ _Just_ _feeling a little ill.”_

_“Did I miss anything important?”_

Steve looks to make sure the professor isn’t standing over his shoulder and texts her, _‘Nothing important_ _. I’ll bring you my notes.’_

He and Peggy were planning to eat lunch together after class. Something quick from the student union like they do most days, but he texts her to say something came up.

When class lets out, Steve heads straight to the grocery store. He remembers when he arrived in Europe, the grocery stores seemed like the most foreign thing. Nothing was where it should be. None of the brands were recognizable, and the ones he did recognize were twice as expensive. They didn’t sell his favorite brand of cereal. Even the peanut butter was different. _How do you fuck up peanut butter?_

But after living in London for a few months, he knows his way around. He can’t find the exact ingredients he's looking for, but he'll manage.

Steve’s not much of a cook, but he’s learned a few things from his mom over the years. She could be a professional chef, in Steve’s  admittedly biased opinion. He could  probably find a few people who would agree with him.

Over the winter break, he asked his mom for recipe suggestions and has been trying them out on Peggy.  She's helpless in the kitchen, which is comforting in a way, considering how in most aspects of her life she's perfect .

Steve checks his phone. Peggy tells him not to worry, she has to meet with Phillips about a recommendation letter anyway. There aren’t any new messages from Ana.

 

A little over an hour later he’s knocking on the door to Jarvis’s apartment. 

He’s been here a few times before, Guy Fawkes Day party, studying for finals with Ana.

The Jarvises didn’t live close to campus like Peggy and Steve. Their apartment is in a sort of rough part of town, but Steve grew up in a rough part of town, so it doesn’t bother him. 

Ana opens the door clad in a fuzzy pink bathrobe and sweatpants. She looks frazzled. Tired. Her eyes  are red and puffy. But she doesn’t look sick.

“Hey Ana,” he says, putting on a smile. “I brought my notes from class, and,” he pulls the Tupperware out of his backpack, “I made chicken noodle soup.

Ana holds open the door and  wordlessly gestures for him to enter the apartment.

"My mom used to make this for me when I was sick. Always made me feel better.”

The interior of the apartment could not be more different than its gruff exterior.  Over weekends of antique shopping, Ana and Edwin managed to find some exquisite pieces of furniture . Every piece of fabric in the home was sewn or knitted by Ana. From the curtains to the pillows to the seat cushions, and several pieces of her art was hanging on the walls.

Stepping into the Jarvis’s apartment is how Steve imagined the Weasley’s Burrow would feel, everything homemade and well-worn .

But today, something feels wrong, something is missing. Ana's smile doesn't light up the room. Instead, she sits in silence while Steve pours them both a bowl of soup.

“Bon appetit,” Steve offers as he sets a bowl in front of her.

She startles, like she forgot he was there, but she recovers and says, “Thank you, Steven. I'm sorry I am not much of a hostess right now.”

He sits next to her. “What’s going on?”

“I-“ Ana pauses for a long moment. Steve waits.

“I was pregnant.”

“You _were_ pregnant?” Steve asks, but the words don’t make any more sense coming out of his mouth. The Jarvis’s don’t have children.

Realization dawns on Steve, but Ana cuts off whatever he was going to say, “It’s not what you think.”

“It’s okay. You don’t need to justify it to me,” Steve says raising his arms to his sides.  “Your body, your choice,” he adds with a cringe, because he’s trying to comfort his friend, not sounds like a bumper sticker .

“I had a miscarriage,” Ana blurts. Her eyes dart across Steve’s face, studying his reaction.

“Oh.”

There’s another round of processing the information before Steve says, “ _Oh._ Are you okay? Have you been to the doctor? Do you need me to take you?” He doesn’t have a car, so the offer is superfluous, but he offers anyway.

“No, I'm fine,” Ana says. “ Medically , I am fine. I went to the doctor yesterday, she said that . . . that I could stay home. Wait for it to pass."

“How long had you known?” Steve asks. “That you were pregnant, I mean. I had no idea.”

“A little over a month. We had not told anyone, not even our parents.  Just me, Edwin, and the doctors."

"I'm so sorry."

"They warned us there was a chance, but I thought, I am young, I am in good health.” She mutters something in Hungarian. Steve is pretty sure it’s a curse.

Steve extends his arm to her, “Come here,” he says, and she collapses into is side.

“Edwin was so happy when we discovered I was pregnant, he — Oh, god. How am I going to tell him?” She sobs into his sweater, and Steve rubs her back as  gently as he can.

“It’s my fault."

“No it’s not,” Steve says without hesitation.

She shakes her head. “It was an accident. The baby. I could not believe it, when I realized I was late. I took test after test after test.”

Her accent grows thicker and she cries harder, but Ana presses on, “I couldn’t help thinking, Edwin and I, we are kids ourselves . We are not ready for this. We are still in school. We can  barely afford this apartment as is, how are we supposed to take care of another person?”

She reaches into the pocket of her robe and pulls out a tissue. She blows her nose and crumbles it up. Stuffs it back in her robe “I contemplated . . . what you thought I did. And when the doctor told me, a part of me  was relieved .”

“That doesn’t make it your fault,” Steve says.

“I wanted to name them Rebekah if she was a girl, and Anton if they were a boy. Edwin wanted to name her _Penelope,_ but I would not have agreed to that.”

“Rebecca is a pretty name,” Steve says, still rubbing her back.

He stays there with Ana for most of the day, a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen. He runs to the store to buy some pain-reliever and her favorite tea, and he stays with her until Edwin comes home.

 

* * *

 

 

** _ 8 April 2017 _ **

 

_“Are you at the apartment?”_ The text from Bucky reads. 

Steve texts yes and returns his focus to the sketchbook in his lap. He’s been so distracted by his other classes, he’s fallen behind on his senior portfolio.  He’s trying to figure out the painting that will be the centerpiece of the collection, but so far everything he’s drawn is crap .

 His phone buzzes again. 

 " _Meet us outside in 5.”_

Steve looks at his sketch. He needs to make some progress on the portfolio before class on Monday. But  maybe clearing his head will help? The fresh air will do him good, he justifies to himself. 

So he slips on sneakers, grabs his wallet and keys, and races down the stairs. As he bursts through the doors, he knows he made the right choice leaving his jacket behind.  Spring weather can be unpredictable in New York, swinging from rainstorms to sunshine to reminders of the winter chill . But today the weather is a promise of summer to come, warm and bright, with a soft, cool breeze. 

Steve loiters on the stoop for a minute before Shuri’s Lexus pulls up to the curve. She shouts, “Get in loser we’re going shopping.”

Steve climbs into the backs. Bucky turns around in the passenger seat and extends his left arm. 

“Give me a fist bump,” he says, prosthetic hand curling into a fist. 

Steve obliges, savoring the big grin on Bucky’s face as he makes contact. 

Around Christmas, Bucky  was invited to be part of a trial for cutting-edge robotic prosthesis .  It was a publicity stunt for the lab that manufactured the technology, celebrating the holidays by giving to veterans in need . But Bucky was smart enough not to turn down free health care.

It was like Bucky grew a new arm.  The prosthetic  was wired to his nervous system, so he could control the arm and it could send sensory input to the brain . Lightyears ahead of what he had before.

Shuri is a bioengineer at the lab that designed prosthetic.  She graduated college even younger than Stark, and she’s one of the head designers despite being the same age as Wanda .

Over all the visits to the lab to  be measured , fitted, and taught how to use the new arm, Bucky and Shuri grew close. It started with texting each other non-stop and evolved into hanging out every week.

“Show him the other thing I taught you.”

“Shuri . . .” Bucky groans. 

“Come on.”

“At least play some fucking music.” 

Shuri turns up the R&B on the radio, and Bucky whips his arms through the air to the beat of the music. Shuri does the same with one arm on the wheel. “It’s called the  Milly Rock,” she explains.

Though Steve hasn’t spent nearly as much time with her as Bucky has, Steve undeniably likes Shuri. She’s intelligent, full of energy, quick to smile, and no one could deny the positive effect she has on Bucky. 

A few months ago, this would have been unimaginable.  Bucky throwing himself into a silly dance, laughing at himself, enjoying a spring day with the windows rolled down .

Though Shuri may deserve the bulk of the credit, Steve has to thank Sam too. They didn’t hit it off the way Bucky might have hoped, but Sam did persuade Bucky to go to the student vets' group therapy. 

Bucky started college in January, plus his work-study assigned him to the student gym. Steve is grateful he's not at the library because he would never be able to visit him at work. 

There were weeks last year when Bucky  barely left the apartment. Getting him to walk to the bodega to pick up some milk was a victory. Now he has reasons to get out of bed each day, and he’s the one inviting Steve to get out of the house.

“So, where are we going?” Steve asks. “Or are you actually taking me shopping?”

“Not that your basic white boy style doesn’t need all the help it can get, but we’re going to Coney Island!”

Steve looks to Bucky for confirmation. “Is anything even open?”

“Luna Park opens today,” Bucky says. “Shuri hooked us up with all-day passes.”

Shuri’s father is the ambassador to an African nation, and her family is crazy rich.  Shuri’s accomplishments are remarkable on their own, regardless of who her parents are . But her family is the reason he knows what the inside of a Lexus looks like. 

 

With the way Shuri drives, they make it to Coney Island in record time. Steve loved going to Coney Island as a kid.  Between the smells of the hotdog vendors and the sounds of the carnival games, Steve’s homework is long forgotten . 

Bucky and Shuri  are engrossed in an argument about Instagram captions, and when she jumps and points ahead .

“Look, there’s almost no line at the Cyclone,” she grabs Bucky and pulls him toward the coaster.

Steve drags his feet behind them. “Please, anything but the Cyclone. I threw up the last time I rode it.”

Bucky waves his hand, the robotic arm moving as  naturally as a real one would. “Only because you got on right after you ate a whole fucking funnel cake. You’ll be fine.”

“I don’t know,” Steve says, eyeing the warning signs.  With his heart condition, he’s not supposed to be riding roller coasters at all, although it hasn’t stopped him in the past . “I’m gonna sit this one out.”

“Sure, we won’t make you ride it if you’re too scared,” Shuri says, with a hint of teasing in her voice. 

“I see what you’re trying to do, and it’s not going to work.”

“I don’t know what you're talking about, Rogers.” Shuri plasters a smile of faux innocence on her face, but as she turns toward the coaster, she makes a chicken noise. 

 

The mechanical _chink chink_ of the chain shakes the carts as they make the slow ascent up the first hill. Shuri sits in the front, with Bucky and Steve in the row behind her. 

He’s not sure how they convinced him to get on the ride. 

His heart pounds harder as they crest the first hill, looking down on the coaster below.  His stomach swoops as the cart plummets — Bucky and Shuri throw their arms in the air and she screams in delight as they fall — before shooting up again .

The old-fashioned carts don’t have dividers between the seats, and as they go around the first sharp curve, Steve’s smaller body slams into Bucky .

Bucky lets the arm close to Steve fall around his shoulders and braces Steve against him. “Careful,” he says with a smile directed right at Steve, and his stomach swoops for a different reason. 

 

When the cart pulls into the station, Shuri and Bucky are out of their seats as soon as the bar lifts. Steve must hesitate a second too long, because Bucky turns to Steve with a concerned look. Steve sucks in a breath and climbs out of the cart after them. 

“That was fun.” Steve plasters a smile on his face and heads for the exit. 

Bucky doesn’t buy it. “Are you okay, Stevie?” 

“I’m fine,” he lies. His heart is going a million miles an hour and his lungs are burning. 

Bucky’s eyes narrow. “You’re not fine. Jesus, look at you, you can  barely stand straight.”

Was he swaying? It happens sometimes when he’s lightheaded. Before he can be sure, Bucky clamps his hand on Steve’s shoulders for the second time that day. This time it annoys Steve a little. 

“Shit, we shouldn’t have made you ride.”

“I’m fine, Buck,” Steve says.  And because he knows Bucky will fret over him until one of them winds up in the hospital, he adds, “I  just need to take it easy for before the next rollercoaster .”

“Fine by me." Bucky points to a nearby bench. "We’ll sit here a bit. Shuri, why don’t you go get us some water?” 

Steve expects Shuri to protest  being bossed around, but her eyes dart from Buck to Steve and back to Bucky. They have some sort of silent conversation.  Steve is too focused on forcing air in and out of his lungs to work out what Bucky says to make Shuri throw her arms in the air and agree to go find a snack cart .

“Do you need your inhaler?” Bucky says, pulling his backpack off his shoulders. 

He’s been in the habit of keeping one of Steve’s rescue inhalers on him since middle school. Steve’s not sure how he got a hold of his new prescription, but he suspects his mother was behind it. 

This isn’t even the first time he’s had to use Bucky’s spare since he's been home.  In January, at the Women’s March, he’d forgotten to bring his inhaler only to realize masses of angry protesters and asthma weren’t a great combination . Bucky had sat with him on a bench, like now, until he was feeling better.

Steve accepts the inhaler, shakes it, and takes a dose. As he holds his breath and waits for the medicine to take effect, he notices Bucky is diverting his eyes. Scanning the crowd, pulling out his phone, looking anywhere but Steve. 

It’s a change — he’s used to Bucky staring at him like he’ll drop dead if he looks away — but not an unwelcome change. 

When he starts to breathe easier, he puts the cap on and hands the inhaler to Bucky to return to the bag. 

“Sorry for ruining you and Shuri’s day.”

Bucky shakes his head. “You didn’t ruin anything, Steve. We’ve got all day. We’ll  just take it easy on the thrill rides.”

“But Shuri was looking forward to-" 

“Shuri won’t give a fuck,” Bucky says. “She spends all day in a clinic around people a lot more pathetic than you.”

“You’re not pathetic,” Steve says like a reflex. 

“Who said anything about me?” Bucky says, faking offense. 

“Jerk.”

“Punk,” Bucky says with a crooked smile. He could look at Steve like that forever, and Steve wouldn’t grow tired of it. But as the thought enters his head, Bucky clears his throat and looks away. 

“Shuri’s cool. I’m glad you became friends with her,” Steve says to break the silence. 

Steve expects Bucky to give some sarcastic response, about how tiring it is to be his friend, but instead, his expression turns serious . “It’s like having a little sister again,” he confesses. 

Steve gets a hollow pit in his stomach that has nothing to do with thrill-ride induced nausea. 

After Rebecca died, hit by a drunk driver in the spring of their senior year, Bucky refused to talk about it.  Eventually , Steve stopped trying to bring it up.  Steve was grieving too — Becca was a staple of his childhood memories almost as much as Bucky — but he knew it was nothing compared to what Bucky was going through . 

If he had done things  differently , if he tried harder to reach Bucky, would Bucky have still enlisted? If he never went to Syria, if he never got blown up . . . well, a lot of things would be different. 

If he’s imagining what-ifs, Steve would rather imagine a world where Rebecca didn’t have to die at all. 

“You know spending all that time in the lab with Shuri,” Bucky says, voice soft. Steve has to concentrate to hear him over the sounds of carnival music and screams from the Cyclone. “And, you know, science was always my favorite subject. I was thinking about majoring in engineering.”

“That’s a great idea,” Steve says. “You be brilliant as an engineer.”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, looking off at nothing in particular, imagining a future where he’s an engineer. Maybe he'll work with Shuri. He’d  probably be her assistant. Steve can picture her bossing him around, giving him mundane tasks  just because she could. 

“You know, I’ve seen you sludging through fucking accounting spreadsheets. Natasha told me you picked up a minor in nonprofit management, but that I should ask you why.”

“I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to do, until about a year ago. I thought about teaching, being an illustrator, marketing,” he shrugs. “I could have made it work. Some of my professors were ready to set me up anywhere they had connections. But none of it seemed right.”

Steve hesitates. The hasn’t  really explained this to anybody.  Maybe he hinted to it with Peggy or Sam, but not the whole truth. It seemed selfish, using Ana’s pain to work out his own shit. 

“Last year, a friend of mine, she was going through a hard time. We were in art together, and that semester she worked harder than ever. She produced these stunning paintings. I can’t even describe them. Some of them are hanging in a museum now, that good. She poured all her pain into her work and made something beautiful.”

Steve  was reduced to tears the first time she showed him one of the paintings. Never in a hundred years could he make something so good. “I had heard of art therapy, but I don’t know, I thought it was one of those rich people things, like service animal turkeys.”

Bucky snorts.

“But I did some research and it’s legit. Research shows it helps with depression, dementia, PTSD,” Steve glances at Bucky out of the corner of his eye. “I don’t know why I was so surprised. I mean, I always used to turn to drawing when I was sick as a kid.” 

When he was awake enough to hold a pencil that is.  There were times, Steve can  barely remember, when the fever would consume him, leave him in an incoherent haze . His mother would grip his hand and pray. He only knew it was her because who else would it be? Before he met Bucky, he had no one else.

Steve doesn’t try to remember those times. He has clearer memories, better memories, of chicken noodle soup, The Princess Bride, and a sketchbook filled with his own fairytales. 

“Problem is, I wasn’t so wrong about it being a rich person thing. Because that's who can afford it. I don’t need to tell you about the state of healthcare in this country.”

“No shit."

“And it’s not likely to get better in the next four years. And mental health care? Forget about it,” Steve says. “But the idea is in my head now, so I talk it over with Sam.”

Bucky makes a noise of disgust, because he’s obligated to pretend to hate Sam.

“We could start a nonprofit. Offer therapy to people who can’t afford it, take it to low-income schools. We could keep the lights on by selling the paintings. We’ll  probably need sponsors too."

“Hence the new minor,” Bucky says, finishing the story for him. 

Steve nods, “Hence the new minor.Sam’s already got the therapy stuff covered, and I’ll bring the art and management side of things.”

“You’ll be fucking incredible at that.”

Steve can feel his face turn red. Right when he got his heart rate under control, Bucky goes as says something like that.

“Hey!” Shuri is calling to them. Her arms  are loaded with soda bottles, cotton candy, and funnel cake. “Come help me with these snacks you made me buy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, I promise no more dead siblings from here on out. If you've read this far, I can't thank you enough. [ Please find me on tumblr ](http://padmedala.tumblr.com) if you want to talk about these characters some more.


	8. February 14, 2016 & December 16, 2017

** _ 14 February 2016 _ **

There’s one date circled on the February page of Peggy’s calendar. 

It may be the only date circled in the whole planner. Peggy usually wasn’t one forsomething as ostentatious as circling. Most of the boxes on the page are filled with scribbles that would be illegible to anyone but her.There’s no colour coding, no fancy lettering, nothing worthy of a Pinterest board. 

But one date is circled, highlighted, and surrounded by little stars. February 12. All to reminder her (as if she could forget) Friday the 12th is the deadline to apply for MI6’s internship program. 

Since the end of winter break, homework, kickboxing, all her other commitments were de-prioritised so she could focus on preparing the application. Gathering letters of recommendation, submitting fingerprints for a background check, proofreading every line of her resume again and again. 

It’s a strong resume, she thinks. Grades at the top of her class, two years of interning with the London police, proficiency in three foreign languages. 

No, the source of her stress isn’t the resume or recommendations or background check, it’s the personal essay. She writes half a dozen different answers to “Why do you want to pursue a career with the Secret Intelligence Service?” and each feels more disingenuous than the last. 

It’s not until her the draft that she gives in and writes about Michael. It feels morose and cheap, like she’s hoping to earn sympathy with the application readers. 

But it’s the truth. So it’s what she writes. She writes about how he always encouraged her dream. How she wants to carry on his legacy of service.

When she’s satisfied, she hires a tutor to proofread it for her. Ana and Jarvis look over a copy too. She even lets her mother see it, a true sign of how desperate she is to get it right, if she’s opening the door for her mother’s criticisms.

(When her mother calls her back, it sounds like she’s been crying. And for the first time, she has no snide remarks about Peggy applying for MI6.) 

 

With all the stress surrounding the internship application, Peggy completely forgets Valentine’s Day. 

As a girl, Peggy always thought Valentine’s Day was a frivolous holiday. She would scoff and roll her at eyes when stores turned pink with decorations. When she was with Fred, he would buy her a bouquet of red roses each year, but never did anything special. 

But Steve never had a reason to celebrate Valentine’s Day before, and he was determined to celebrate with every cliché possible. 

He gives her flowers too, a bouquet of irises. They were resting on the trey when he made breakfast in bed. At lunch, she was presented with a box of chocolates and a handmade card. And for dinner, Steve made reservations at some upscale restaurant. 

Peggy takes her time to get ready. She curls her hair and slips on the dress her aunt gave her for Christmas. She’s been looking for an opportunity to wear it; it’s too formal to wear to class, too low-cut to wear to work. But when Steve sees her in it, she knows she made right choice. 

 

“The reservation is under Rogers.” 

The maitre d’ looks Steve up and down. He’s not as dressed up as Peggy. All his suits are in New York. He borrowed a jacket from Jarvis, but it doesn’t really fit. He still looks nice to Peggy, of course, but this place is even fancier than Steve led Peggy to believe. The host makes no attempt to hide his contempt as he says, “I’m sorry. We don’t have a reservation under that name.”

Steve clenches his jaw. “Could you check again? I made it two weeks ago.”

The host makes half an attempt to review his book, but there are other patrons to help. Older, wealthier patrons. So when he shakes his head, Peggy grabs Steve’s elbow and guides him outside before he can protest. 

Steve is split in two, half spilling apologies to Peggy, half contemplating charging back inside and giving the restaurant employee a piece of his mind. “We’re never gonna find another restaurant that won’t have a wait. Everywhere was booked when I called.”

“It’s fine, darling.” It’s probably for the best really, she has no idea how he’d be able to afford a meal there. “Let’s just go to The Constitution.”

“We go there every week. I wanted to do something special.” 

“Well, let’s go grab a bite and have a few drinks, and then maybe we can do something special _after.”_

Steve’s ears go red. 

In that moment, it seemed like the lost reservation would only be a blip in an otherwise lovely day. But it was the tip of the iceberg. All downhill from there. 

It starts to drizzle on the way to the pub, not strong enough to justify hailing a cab, but enough to chill. Steve tries to offer Peggy his jacket; she refuses to take it. Only when the damp air sends Steve into a coughing fit does he begrudgingly put the coat back on. 

Steve is in a sour mood by the time they get to the pub. And Peggy, worn out by the stress of preparing her application, doesn’t have the energy to pull him out of it. 

He goes to the bar to order drinks, while she tries to find a table. The Constitution is packed, not with other couples, but men and women trying to forget they’re alone on Valentine’s Day. Peggy’s almost surprised Howard isn’t there, looking for some company for the night. 

That’s how it happens. Some guy sees her alone and sees an opportunity. It’s sleazy flirting, nothing Peggy hasn’t had to deal with before. Maybe he’s a little drunk or maybe he’s just a creep, but he has no understanding of personal space. When Steve returns drinks in hand, he finds Peggy with a strange man pressed against her, leering down the front of her dress.

And well, Steve’s temper was a short fuse on a good day.

 

“Peggy, wait!”

She doesn’t wait. Doesn’t even slow down. 

Steve breaks into a jog to catch up to her. “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, you just ignored me,” she fumes. “I say ‘walk away’ and you hear ‘let’s take it outside.’”

“Well, you can’t expect me to do nothing. Not when a guy . . . treats you like that, Peggy. Calls you _that._ ”

She turns on him now. “I don’t need you defending me, Steven. I can take care of myself.”

“You think I don’t know that? Hell, Peggy, you’re the one who taught me to punch.”

“I didn’t teach you so you could go picking fights with anybody you dislike.”

“I wasn’t picking a fight -“ Steve starts, but Peggy’s glare cuts him off. “Look, I’m sorry. Maybe I overreacted. But I don’t you think you’re reacting a little strong too?”

Steve cringes, realising that was that was wrong thing to say before she can even form the words. “Oh, I’m sorry. How should I react? Should I swoon for my knight in shining armour?”

“No, Peggy -“ Steve runs his hand through his hair, pausing to chose his next words more carefully. “I know you don’t need me to protect you. Okay? I know. But I couldn’t just do nothing. What if it had been some other girl who couldn’t how to take care of herself, huh? He needs to know he can’t talk to women like that.”

“And I’m sure a right hook to the chin knocked the misogyny out of him,” she says flatly.

Steve doesn’t have a quick response to that, so she presses on. “I know what it’s like to want to solve your problems with a punch but it never works. I’ve dealt with creeps like that before, and I’ll deal with creeps again. And you need to trust I know the right way to handle the situation.”

“You need me to trust you?”

“Yes, relationships. They need trust.”

Steve mumbles something she can’t make out. 

“What?”

“Nothing.” He shrugs. Starts lazily walking in the direction of his dorm. 

Peggy strides to follow him. “Steve. What?”

“It’s just, that’s rich coming from you,” Steve says bitterly.

She grabs his arm. “You think I don’t trust you?”

“I _know_ you don’t trust me.” He pulls his arm from Peggy’s grasp and counts the points on his fingers. “You didn’t introduce me to your roommate until we’d been dating a month. Didn’t introduce me to your parents until you basically had to. You don’t tell me about your brother, _your best friend.”_

“You know why I didn’t talk to you about Michael,” she says through gritted teeth. 

“Why didn’t you let me proofread your application?” Steve throws his arms out to his sides. “I mean you let everybody else read it. But I guess you don’t _trust_ my opinion.”

Peggy flounders. “I . . . I didn’t realise you wanted to read it.”

“It’s not about wanting to read it; it’s about wanting to help you. But we can’t have that, can we? Can’t let me help you with your application. Can’t let me defend you from creeps in the bar. Can’t let your guard down or let anybody in.”

Peggy is dumbfounded. Where is all this coming from?

“Wait. _You_ ’re accusing _me_ of being too proud to ask for help? Which one of us was nearly hospitalised because they didn’t tell their kickboxing instructor they had asthma? You’re upset I didn't take you to meet my parents, but I had to beg you to spend Christmas with us.” 

“Just forget about it.” He turns towards his dorm.

“That’s it?” she calls out. “You’re going to bring up a laundry list of complaints about me then walk away.”

Steve exhales deeply, his head tilted up at the sky. “Look, clearly I’m not good company right now, and I doubt you’d want to be around me even if I was. So let’s call it a night. Happy fucking Valentine’s Day.”

Peggy is taken aback by his tone, but his words are true. Both of them need to cool off. So much for her plans for later. 

So she walks to her flat alone. She’s not going to cry over some stupid boy. She never shed a tear over Fred. 

She should feel angry. She does feel angry. But she also feels something else. Guilt, maybe. Steve had been so excited to celebrating the holiday, and she’d gone and mucked it up.

If it had been any other man, trying to defend her, treating her like she was property to protect, she would have broken up with him on the spot. 

But this was Steve. Steve who didn’t know when to keep his mouth shut, didn’t know how to keep his fists at his sides.

Another part of her feel guilty because, well, the countdown has started. Maybe they always knew they’re time together would be limited. Steve will being returning to America soon, and Peggy, hopefully, to MI6 training. She won’t have time to date, let alone carry on a long distance relationship. Peggy knew a career in intelligence would mean sacrifices to her personal life, but she hadn’t thought much of it. It was like knowing she might have to work weekends, or that the paychecks come every other Friday. It was just part of the job. 

But as she crawls into bed that night, she considers for the first time the loneliness of it.

 

* * *

 

** _ 16 December 2017 _ **

They keep her at the office through the night.

She was Christmas shopping when she realised she was being followed. Two Russia operatives, one she recognised as Jerome Zandow. She lost the tail and circled back to HQ. 

This is the story she tells again and again. First to Sousa and Thompson, then Dooley when he arrives, clearly upset at being called from home. 

They don’t believe her at first, and she has to bite her tongue so she doesn’t say something she’ll regret. _Why would she make this up?_

Then doubt turns to accusation. _“How long have the been tailing you?” “Why didn’t you notice sooner?”_

They press her for more details. Where exactly was she when she spotted the men? When was was this? What did they look like?

It’s easy enough to leave Angie out of her reports. She was shopping on her own. She lost the tail on her own. There’s no need for the bureau to know about how Angie put herself in danger to help Peggy get away clear. 

But while it’s easy to erase Angie from the story, it’s harder to get her out of Peggy’s head. She kept checking her phone, wondering if Angie got home safely. She replays the evening in her head, trying to identify how she could have done things differently. 

There’s a mountain of paperwork to fill out. Then photos to look through. She tries to identify the unknown Russia mobster to no avail. Her back is aching from sitting hunched over in her stiff desk chair when Dooley calls her into his office.

They’re giving her a leave of absence. A few weeks so they can figure out what’s going on. If she’s being followed, they can’t risk her giving bureau information. Rose will take over her cases. She turns down the offer for extra protection. She can take care of herself. 

 

The sun is coming up as she walks towards her flat, casting the streets in an eerie orange light. Peggy checks over her shoulder the whole way. She’s a clash of frantic energy and exhaustion. with a frantic energy. She could sleep through the next day, but there is something she has to do first.

She texts Angie to meet her at the L&L. It’s freezing, but Angie is waiting outside the restaurant when Peggy walks up. She’s standing by the door with her arms wrapped around her, clutching her coat and pulling it tight. 

“Hey,” she says, the word bone dry. 

She takes in Peggy’s appearance, the same clothes as last night, the frazzled hair. Peggy is sure her concealer rubbed away long ago, revealing the purple bags underneath her eyes. She hadn’t even bothered to reapply her lipstick, and

“Do you want to go in and get some coffee? Or . . .” her voice trails off.

Peggy shakes her head. “We can’t talk here.” There are too many people about. Most are typical New Yorkers minding their own business, but anyone of them could be another agent. It makes Peggy shudder. How long could she have been followed at not realised it?

They make the short walk to Peggy’s flat in silence. 

It’s is the first time Peggy has had another person in the room since the landlord passed over the keys. It feels even smaller than it did then. Her Murphy bed is folded up, but there’s still barely enough room to move around each other.Peggy leans against the kitchen table/desk/ironing board so Angie can have the lone chair.

“Jeez, English. Some place you’ve got here,” she says, taking in the grimy carpet and water stained ceiling. Her neighbour’s music is blaring through the walls. 

Peggy thinks of Angie’s apartment, with its brightly covered walls and comfy couch. She remembers the Jarvis’s old flat, everything floor to ceiling homemade. Even her parent’s house with its posh decor and breakable antiques would feel more welcoming than this. 

“I’d offer you something to eat, but-“ she gestures to the kitchen nook, holds open the door to the mini fridge. It’s empty save for a jar of jam and a half-drunk bottle of wine. “Well, you see why I spend so much time at the café.”

“And here I was flattering myself thinking it had something to do with the company.” Angie’s jaw is set, her mouth a thin line.

“Angie . . .” Peggy starts.

“It doesn’t matter,” she says bluntly. “I didn’t come here for food. I came here so you can explain why I was followed by some Slavic thugs last night. Then I’ll be out of your hair.”

Peggy cringes. She could understand Angie to being angry with her, but this is worse. She’s cold. All the light gone from her eyes. Peggy wants to say she’s the best thing the café has to offer by a mile, the only reason she kept coming back.

But the reason they’re having this conversation, now and here in her dingy apartment, is because she put Angie in danger. She could let Angie think their relationship was built on convenience, that it was a lie from the start, if it meant keeping her safe. 

“First, you need to understand I’m not supposed to be telling you any of this. And you can’t tell anyone, not your roommates, not your family, no one.” 

Angie is studying her with a skeptical look on her face, trying to determine this is all an elaborate prank. 

“I know that sounds ridiculously dramatic, but you have to believe me. I could lose my job. I could be . . . worse. Do you understand?”

Angie nods solemnly.

“You were right, I don’t work for AT&T, although I don’t know how you knew.” Peggy begins pacing the small room.

Angie scoffs, like it was obvious. Peggy knows it wasn’t. She’s followed the protocol for maintaining a cover. Angie has even seen her AT&T employee ID badge.

But something about Angie makes Peggy transparent. None of her lies or bravado work on her.

Perhaps that’s why it’s easy to say the next part.

“I work for the British Secret Intelligence Service. Better known as MI6.”

“MI6?” Angie asks, dumbfounded.“Like James Bond?”

Peggy brings her fingers to pinch the bridge of her nose. “I swear those movies will be the death of me.”

“So you’re a spy?”

“An agent.”

“Which is basically a spy.” Angie is smirking now, enjoying being contrarian.

“It’s not like the movies. It’s not car chases and shoot outs and wooing gorgeous women-“

Angie raises a brow.

“It’s a lot of paperwork, sitting a desk, translating, decoding. It’s not glamorous,” Peggy sighs. “But it is dangerous. And I dragged you into it. And for that I could never apologise enough.” She’s still pacing, but Angie reaches out and grabs her arm. Easy enough to do in the small space. 

“Peggy, relax,” she says bringing her hand down to Peggy’s and intertwining their fingers. The earlier animosity is gone, her blue eyes sympathetic. “I’m fine. We’re both fine.”

Angie looks down at her lap before she asks, “Is that why you were pushing me away?”

Peggy frees her hands from Angie’s grasp. “You said I have a tragic past.”

“I was _joking_ ,” Angie says emphatically.

“You weren’t far off the mark,” Peggy sets her mouth in a hard line. “I seem to have a habit of losing people closest to me. Perhaps ‘losing’ is too nice a word.”

Angie’s brows draw together. ”What are you talkin’ about?”

“My brother died. When I was eighteen. He was serving in Afghanistan. Then one day, he wasn’t.”

“Gee, Peg . . .” Angie starts to say, but Peggy pushes on.

“My father died a year ago. A heart attack. He’d already had one, just a few months before, so it shouldn’t have come as such a shock.”

Peggy feels the beginning of tears, a choking sensation in the back of her throat, but she keeps talking. The facts flow from her mouth devoid of emotion, like she’s giving a mission report.

“A month later, my old flatmate Colleen was diagnosed with leukaemia . . .”

Angie reaches for her hand again. “Peggy, none of that’s your fault.”

“Wilkes was.”

Angie looks at her curiously, but she doesn’t say anything. She rubs her thumb along the back of Peggy’s hand and waits for her to continue.

“Jason Wilkes. He was a scientist in Moscow. I convinced him to work with MI6 as an informant. His boss had friends in high places,” she says with a humourless laugh. “This was my first real mission. I was fresh out of training, so eager to prove myself, and I got him killed.”

Peggy expects Angie to recoil, but she stays there. Her silence stretches for ages before she says, “Did you do what you could to protect him?”

Peggy shakes her head. “I was reckless. I was arrogant. I was _bloody_ -“

“Yeah, but did you want him dead?” Angie asks. “Were you the one to pull the trigger?”

And Peggy is the one to pull away. “Of course not.”

“Damn right.” Angie stands, moves into Peggy’s space. “I know you Peggy. I know you did what you thought would keep him safe. You’re not responsible for Wilkes death any more than you’re responsible for the goons that we’re following us last night.“

Peggy starts to protest, but Angie holds up her hand. “No, you’ve had your chance to explain, now let me say what I have to say about all this.”

Peggy closes her mouth. 

“I get it, okay? You feel guilty about what happened to Wilkes, and you don’t want it to happen again. Right?”

Peggy nods. 

“You don’t want it to happen to me. You don’t want to lose someone else you care about?” she asks, softer, less sure of herself. 

Peggy nods again, without breaking eye contact with Angie. 

“Look, losing people . . . it sucks. I’m not gonna tell you it doesn’t. But your brother and your dad, do you think they’d want you to be lonely for the rest of your life?”

Peggy winces. Angie runs a hand through her hair, messing the curls.”Sorry. That was a low blow. That’s not the point I’m tryin’ to make.”

Angie takes a deep breath, steeling herself. “The point is: you could work for AT&T or MI6 or the Queens 4H and I’d still be head over heels for you.”

Angie chuckles a little, in a self-pitying way. “I have no clue where we go from here. I guess that’s up to you. But I’m saying, I know the truth now. I acknowledge the risk, and I still want to be your friend. And, you know . . . more than friends. If you’d want that.”

Her hands flop to her side. “That’s the end of my big, dramatic monologue. You can talk now.” 

Peggy thinks about how she feels coming home to her dreary, one-room apartment. Eating a microwaved dinner on the rickety fold-out chair. Putting on headphones so she won’t hear her neighbour’s conversation through the walls.

She thinks about how she feels going over to Angie’s, living room full of light and laughter. Leftover lasagne or fried plantains or biscuits and gravy in the fridge. The roommates singing along to whatever music is on the radio, regardless of skill. 

She thinks, absurdly, of a photo she saw on Facebook. She’s still friends with Steve’s mother, who posted a photo the other day of Steve and Sarah decorating a Christmas tree. Looking ridiculous, drowning is matching sweaters. Peggy felt a pang of longing when she saw the photo, not for the man she lost, but for the intimacy of it. She misses feeling so comfortable with someone else.

And before she can think of anything else, Peggy grabbing Angie, pulling her into a fierce hug, burying her face against Angie’s neck. Angie stumbles under the force of Peggy slamming her body into hers, but she wraps her arms around Peggy and holds her tight. 

Peggy leans away just long enough to meet Angie’s eye, and then she’s leaning forward again, this time bringing their mouths together. 

Any remaining trepidation Angie had is gone. She’s an enthusiastic kisser, tangling her hands in Peggy’s hair, pulling her closer. Peggy can feel Angie’s smile against her lips, but she doesn’t pull away. 

And though less than an hour ago, Peggy thought she didn’t have the energy for anything other than sleep, now she can’t think of anything she would rather do than kiss Angie. So they stay there, kissing again and again, for a long time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for the delay between this chapter and the last. I PROMISE I will not abandon this story. However, I make no promises about how long these last two chapters will take. I didn’t have them fully drafted before I started the story, and I’ve had to change things. So if you’re following the story I would anticipate the last few chapters will take a few weeks each.


	9. April 15, 2016 & May 17, 2017

** _ 15 April 2016 _ **

 

“What about-” Peggy’s voice trails off as she tries to think of a movie. “Empire Strikes Back?”

“Han and Leia?” Steve asks. 

Peggy nods to confirm. 

“Leia,” Steve says, his tone conveying the _duh_ he doesn’t need to voice. “Okay, Pirates of the Caribbean?”

Peggy takes a moment to consider, “I think I would have to go with Elizabeth.”

Steve sits up in his seat. “Over Orlando Bloom?”

“When I try to imagine it, I picture Legolas,” Peggy says. 

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Steve grumbles. 

Peggy giggles. Steve watches her eyes drift from the road to her cell phone where it rests in the cupholder between their seats. He knows she’s itching to check her email, so he nudges her arm. “Your turn.”

“I can’t think of any more movies,” she protests.

“What about . . . Rapunzel or Flynn Rider?”

“That’s an animated movie.” She gives him an exasperated look. 

“So?”

Peggy sighs sharply. “Rapunzel.”

Steve throws his hands up, “You would rather sleep with Rapunzel than _Flynn Rider?”_

_“_ I would _rather_ not think of children’s characters in that light at all.”

“Fine then. If you’re going to play that way, we can sit here in awkward silence.” Steve turns his head to the window for emphasis. 

It’s spring break, and they’re in Scotland. They took the overnight train to Edinburgh last night, and now they’re driving up into the highlands. 

Steve sighs as he takes in the scenery. It’s beautiful. The rounded green hills, the sharp rock formations. He hasn’t traveled in America much, a few school trips upstate and the one vacation to Arizona, but he knows the Scottish landscape is unlike anything he could find stateside. 

He feels like he’s stumbled into a magical place, Narnia or Neverland. Like Hogwarts could be behind the next bend in the road. He’s about to tell Peggy as much when he see her left hand drifting toward her cell. 

He swats her hand away. “You said you wouldn’t check until we got to the hostel.”

She’s supposed to hear back from MI6 sometime this week. It’s been two months since she submitted her application, right before their big fight on Valentine’s Day. Steve has never seen her so anxious. “You probably don’t have a signal out here anyway.”

“I can’t know that unless I check,” she argues. 

“You’re driving.”

“You could check for me?” She smiles at him sweetly. “Please, darling. I haven’t looked at my email for two hours. I haven’t even talked about it, and it’s eating at me.”

Steve sighs in a put-upon way and grabs her phone. “You have nothing to be worried about. They’d be crazy not to take you,” he says, meaning every word. 

Peggy hums noncommittally. She drums her fingers on the steering wheel. 

He enters her password and pulls up the email. For a minute he thinks he was right, that there’s no signal out here. But then the app refreshes and there is an unread email sitting in her inbox. 

His eyes skim over the first few lines three times before he says anything, afraid he might be misreading it. 

“Steve?” she asks, voice tinged with worry. 

He feels a grin break out on his face. “You got it.” 

His body flies forward as Peggy slams on the breaks. “What?”

“Don’t crash the car,” he laughs. “I said you got in.” 

Peggy is already pulling over. There is barely a shoulder on the small country road they’re on, and Peggy is grabbing the phone from his hands as soon as the car is in park. He turns on the hazard lights for her. 

She’s reading the email, mouthing the words as she goes. “I don’t believe it. I’ve been accepted.”

“Well, I’ve got to trouble believing it,” Steve says. “Congratulations.” She grabs his shoulders and pulls him into a fierce hug. She’s shaking a little, and he thinks she might be crying, but when she pulls away her eyes are dry. She grabs the sides of his face and plants a kiss on him for good measure.

“We’ll need to find a pub,” she says as if she’s just been struck with the idea. “To celebrate.”

“We should probably check in to our hostel first,” Steve reminds her. 

“Right of course,” she shakes her head. Puts the car back in drive. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. You’re happy. And you’ve got every right to be.”

She looks over at him and he can see a little bit of that happiness fall from f her eyes. “Are you alright?”

“Why wouldn’t he be?” he says, with as much enthusiasm as he can muster. He’s happy for her. He really is, but something in his tone must say otherwise, because now she’s biting her lip, looking at him with concern. 

“I know you were- you’re still figuring out what you want to do with your life,” she says haltingly. “And there’s nothing wrong with that. But I don’t want you to feel like I’m. . . leaving you behind.” 

Steve is still figuring things out — that’s supposedly why he came to the U.K. in the first place — but over the past few weeks an idea has been forming in his head. Nothing concrete, he wants to talk it over with Sam, and his mom. But there’s something that is starting to take shape. 

“I know whatever you do,” Peggy says. “It will be great. You’re one of the most remarkable people I’ve ever met.” 

“Aw, Peggy,” he shakes his head.He feels his ears start to burn. He never knows how to take a compliment. 

“I mean it. I’m a better person for having known you.”

 

* * *

 

17 May 2017

 

Steve’s mom insists on the graduation party. He tells that she doesn’t need to go to all that trouble. “None of my friends are doing anything special,” he says. 

“None of them have family in New York. I have to pick up the slack,” she insists. Steve eventually agreed. There was no stopping his mom when she put her mind to something (Where do you think he got it from?) Besides if it wasn’t all about him — Nat and Sam were graduating too, and Bucky finished his first semester with straight As — then it wouldn’t be so bad. 

After the commencement ceremony, and after posing for dozens of photos, Steve and his mom go back to her apartment, his old apartment. He helps her make hors d’oeuvres and deserts to put out for the part. Nat and Clint show up an hour later to help decorate. They hang up banners that say “Congrats to the Grad” and put on party hats. 

Not long after that, the guests start filtering in. Steve’s surprised at how many people his mom invited. There are his friends from college, of course, and a few of his mom’s friends from church. But then there are teachers from high school, his old little league coach, neighbors from their old apartment building. 

But there is one person that should be there and yet is inexplicably missing. 

“Have you seen him?” he asks Nat.

“Not since the ceremony,” she shrugs. “He said he had an errand to run, that he’d meet us here.”

Steve looks around the room, as if he could have missed him coming in.

“What’s got you so worked up?” Natasha asks, taking in his anxious demeanor. “You see James every day.”

“Nothing.” Steve leans against the wall casually. Well, what he hopes is casual. “Just had something I’ve been meaning to tell him.”

Natasha’s eyebrows go up at that. She can tell, somehow, what he’s resolved to do. Thankfully, Steve’s spared any prying questions by his mom appearing at his shoulder.

“Will you go ahead and open your gifts, honey? The Parkers left their nephew home alone so they want to head back soon.” She’s already grabbed him by his shoulders, guiding him to the armchair by the present table. 

Nat purses her lips and gives him a look that says _“You got lucky this time.”_

He slaps on a faux-innocent smile and shrugs. _“What can you do?”_

Steve doesn’t particularly want to open gifts in front of everybody that cam, but Ben and May are smiling at him so sweetly. He accepts the giftbag his mom hands him without question. Inside there’s a nice leather wallet and a crisp twenty dollar bill. He gives them both the Parkers a hug. 

Most of the gifts are checks or cash. He saves the Barnes for last, hoping Bucky will arrive before he gets to it. But he still hasn’t shown by the time he’s tearing off the paper on the small box. It’s a watch, expensive and well made from what Steve can tell. It belonged to George’s grandfather, Steve learns from the letter they wrote. They tell him how proud they are, and he tears up a little reading it. 

He thinks that’s the last of it, but then he notices a letter on the floor. He looks to the return address, wondering who could be left. There’s no namer, but the stamps on the envelope are in Russian. He glances at Natasha, wondering if this could be her doing, but she shows no sign of recognition.

He tears open the envelope and unfolds the letter inside, instantly recognizing the handwriting. 

Peggy. 

Through the summer and fall, the two of them had kept in touch. It was awkward at first. Steve had no idea how most people talk to their exes, if they talk at all. But as he was re-adjusting to life in America, dealing with Bucky’s adjustment to civilian life, he found there was no one he’d rather talk to than her. She listened, offered advice, and called him out on his bullshit when he needed it. 

That was while she was in training. She couldn’t tell him anything about her work, but she could at least keep in touch. In January, she was given her first mission. To Russia, he supposed. He’s barely heard from her since them. 

And now after all those months, a letter.

 

_Dearest Steve,_

_I hear congratulations are in order. Don’t ask how I know, I can’t reveal my sources. I’m sorry I can’t do more to stay in touch, but know I’m thinking of you. I have no doubt that this is just the first of many accomplishments. Stay strong always._

_Love,_

_Peggy_

 

Steve feels an ache in his heart reading over Peggy’s words, but it’s an echo of what it once was. A part of him will always love Peggy, he thinks. You only get on first love, one first heartbreak. But what he feels now bears more resemblance to fondness than longing. 

It’s at that moment, as Steve is refolding Peggy’s letter an gently tucking it between his other gifts, that Bucky walks in. He’s still wearing the suit he wore to the commencement ceremony. It’s a good look on him. 

Bucky smiles at him from over the heads of the people at the party, and Steve feels everything he didn’t feel at the memory of Peggy. A buzzing under his skin, a warmth in his belly. Not just a tug on his heart but a yearning. Steve smiles back.

 

Eventually, the party winds down. Like the Parkers, most of the adults don’t want to say out late. And most of the college kids, or recent grads, have other parties to go to. Sam, Nat, and Clint are headed to Scott Lang’s place, but Steve declines to join them under the pretense of helping his mom clean up. 

He collects the discarded plates and glasses from the living room, carrying as many as he can to the kitchen. Bucky’s there. He’s discarded his coat jacket somewhere, and the sleeves of his dress shirt are sloppily rolled up so he can wash the dishes. Steve sets the dirty plates in one side of the sink and moves to Bucky’s side. Without a word, he hands Steve the bowl he was scrubbing for Steve to dry off.

“You’re not going to the party? I thought now that you and Scott were engineering buddies . . .”

Bucky snorts. “Lang is alright if you need someone to study vector statics with, but I’m not going to chose partying with him over spending time with you.”

Steve knows that probably puts a ridiculous smile on his face so he ducks his head. They wash the dishes the dishes in comfortable silence until the pile Steve brought in from the living room is gone and the drying rack is overflowing.

Bucky jerks his head in the direction of Steve’s bedroom, and Steve follows. His mom is still chatting with some of the women from her book club in the entryway, but everyone else has gone home. Steve closes the door behind them.

The bedroom is identical to how it looked when they were in high school. Same bunkbeds, same dumb posters, same rickety desk, crowded with art supplies too cheap for him to bring to college. Bucky, even bigger now than he was when they graduated, pulls himself onto the top bunk in two graceful moments. Steve clambers up after him. 

Bucky is lounging back, eyes closed, but he hears Steve settle next to him and he says, “So how does it feel, Mr. Bachelor of Arts?” 

“I don’t know. Doesn’t really feel real yet. Part of me is glad to have it over with, but-“ Steve struggles to put the mix of eagerness and anxiety he feels into words. “I’m a real adult now. I’m going to have to start like paying taxes and stuff.”

Bucky opens one eye. “You’ve had a part-time job since sophomore year. I’m pretty sure you should’ve already been paying taxes.”

Steve shoves his knee. “I’m going to have to get health insurance.”

“Not for another four years,” Bucky points out, tilting his head slightly. 

“Yeah. Thanks, Obama,” Steve says flatly. 

“Yeah, I think you’ve got one or two fucking preexisting conditions.”

“I’m going to have to start paying full price for Spotify. No more student discount.”

“You can just use my account. I have better taste in music anyway.” 

Steve shoves Bucky again. Harder this time. With lightning fast reflexes, Bucky reaches out and grabs Steve’s wrist. Pulls on it until he’s sitting up next to Steve. “Wanna see your gift?”

“I already opened it.” He shakes the hand with the watch on it. “You’d know that if you didn’t show up an hour late.”

“No that -“ he shakes his head. “The watch is from my parents. I’m talking about _my_ gift.”

“Oh, I get two gifts,” Steve says with a big smile.

“Not if you’re gonna be an asshole about it.” But as Bucky says it he reaches behind him and pulls a wrapped box from underneath the pillow. Steve raises an eyebrow. When did sneak into his bedroom and plant the gift?

Bucky sets it in Steve’s lap and watches as Steve unwraps it. Just to be a pain, Steve takes his time, working his fingers under the tape, slowly peeling it away. When the cardboard is free from the wrapping paper, he sets the box down and starts folding the paper like he’s going to save it. 

“Jesus Christ,” Bucky mutters. He rips the lid of the box. Inside there’s a small book. A scrapbook. 

“I know it’s sappy but. Didn’t know what else to get you,” Bucky murmurs. Slipping on his suave persona, he adds, “Thought about a new coffee pot, but it seemed a little selfish for some reason.”

Steve laughs. They both know Steve only drinks coffee on especially stressful weeks, while Bucky would ingest coffee through an IV if he could.

“I’ve been working on it for a few weeks,” Bucky says, back in the softer voice. “But I was waiting on my mom to send me a few photos. They only arrived today.”

“So that’s where you were,” Steve says, with an exaggerated tone of realization.

“Yeah, can you forgive me for being late now, punk?”

“Jury’s still out,” Steve says, but he knows that sappy smile is back on his face. Steve’s not sure if it’s the term of endearment or the scrapbook. There are photos going back to when they first met, all through high school, and plenty from this last year of college. It’s mostly candids, some Steve didn’t even realize someone was taking photos.

“Do you remember in eighth grade — it was the first time we didn’t have a class together — and we would carry around walkie talkies wherever we went?” Steve asks.

“We wouldn’t have had to if my parents just let me have a cell phone.”

“No, but all the kids that had cell phones just got them confiscated. When they tried to take away the walkie talkies, we tried to argue there was no rule against them. They had to change the student handbook because of us.”

Bucky laughs. “Do you remember that kid that got a cell phone before everybody else and was a real ass about it? What was his name? Something dumb, Brent or Bront or something.”

“Brock.”

“Yeah, something dumb like that.”

Steve rolls his eyes, and Bucky leans into his shoulder to say he knows Steve is right about the name. “And we changed the language settings in his phone-“

“To Vietnamese,” Steve finished his sentence. “Because he was making fun the new student.”

“How long did he have to pretend to be nice before Yinsen would change it back?”

“I think he tried for a few days, but when his parents found out they just reset the phone to factory settings. He was so upset about losing his high score on Fruit Ninja, remember?”

“Oh my god,” Bucky slaps Steves shoulder as he doubles over in laughter. 

They go back and forth like that for a while, just trading memories, before Steve swallows and asks, “Do you remember when you kissed me?”

Bucky goes still mid-laugh. They’re sitting almost exactly like they had that night, legs dangling over the edge of the bed, shoulder to shoulder. 

Steve, he knows, will turn red at the drop of a hat. His cheeks, his ears, his neck, bright as a tomato. Bucky was always the suave one, cool as a cucumber. But Steve swears that his cheeks are going a little pink now. He clears his throat. “Well, yeah. That’s not the kind of thing a guy usually forgets.”

He meets Steve’s eyes. Steve tries to parse out all the different emotions on his face. There’s something else he wants to say, something worrying him. There’s maybe embarrassment at the resurfaced memory and confusion at why Steve would bring it up now. But there’s something else, Steve thinks. Longing. Yearning. 

“The guy in those photos, Steve. I’m not that guy anymore.”

Maybe that should seem like a hard turn from what Steve just said, but he gets it. 

He’s not the guy in the photos either. He may not have been through hell and back like Bucky, and he can never understand what he’s been through, but he has changed. 

And whatever is between them, it isn’t just a high school crush. It isn’t a fumbling first kiss or closeted experimentation. 

Because Steve has been in love. Been in a relationship. Had survived drag-out fights with the person he loved. He no longer harbored romantic notions that getting together meant happily ever after. A first kiss is just the beginning, and the nerves surrounding getting together are nothing compared to the hard work of staying together. He’s seen the ways a relationship could fall apart: miscommunication, a lack of trust, stubborn pride. 

But Bucky and Steve had already weathered storms. They know how to fight and make up. There’s no on that understands him better than Bucky, no one he trusts more.

And now Bucky is looking a Steve with so much vulnerability in his eyes. “I know you’re not.” Steve puts his hand on his shoulder, a reassuring touch. “But I love you all the same.”

And Steve knows it’s true. Bucky is changed. And Steve is falling in love with this new person more and more each day. He loves the long hair and the roughened skin. He loves how he can sit in silence and stillness. He loves that he can laugh despite everything he’s been through.

In Bucky’s eyes, there is a spark of hope. And then Steve is leaning in. And Bucky is leaning in too. 

Steve hopes he’s a better kisser than he was eight years ago. 

One hand is carding through Steve’s hair, while the prosthetic clutches his shirt and pulls him close. Steve tries something with his tongue, and Bucky moans. _Yeah, definitely better than eight years ago,_ he thinks. 

 

Later, after they pull away, and Bucky says he loves Steve too. After they kiss again, more intensely the second time. After they agree they should stop before things get out of hand on Steve’s childhood bunkbeds. After they straighten their clothes, go out to the living room, and put something on the TV. As they sit there, fingers clasped between them, Steve wonders whether the I-told-you-sos will be worse coming from Natasha, who never really stopped trying to set them up, or Peggy, who insisted on multiple occasions that straight guys don’t kiss their best friends unprompted. (Even later, he would learn that Nat and Peggy, though they do tease, have nothing on his own mother, who had been waiting for them to get together for years).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you like it? sorry again for the delay between updates. just one chapter left, and it's sort of an epilogue, so hopefully, it won't take too long to get it to you, but I can't say for sure


	10. May 6, 2016 & December 31, 2017

 

** _ 6 May 2016 _ **

“Well, this is it I guess.” Steve turns to face the small group that had assembled to see him off. He lets go of his suitcase and lets his hands fall to his side.

His hallmates had already gone through to security. That left Ana, Jarvis, and Peggy. 

Ana is openly weeping, so Steve hugs her first. He’s doing his best to hold it together, all things considered. His eyes may be wet, but his chin is held high.

Ana on the other hand as no shame burying her face into his shoulder and sobbing. “I can not believe you are leaving us. It seems like we just met.”

“I’m going to miss you too.”

She pulls away and grabs him by the arm "We are going to stay in touch,” she says leaving no room for question. 

Jarvis isn't one for hugs, but he makes an exception for Steve, repeating his wife’s statements about staying in touch. Then all three of them turn to Peggy. The Jarvises beg off to give Steve and her some semblance of privacy. 

They talked it all over last night after the going away party. They knew it was coming, but that didn’t make it easier. 

“Steve,” she says, and it sounds like she’s been crying. 

“Peggy,” he says, and it sounds like _‘I love you.’_

She offers him one last kiss on his cheek. “Take care of yourself, darling.”

 

* * *

 

 

_** 31 December 2017, New Year’s Eve ** _

 

“If you don’t quit fussing I’m gonna get jealous.” Angie wraps her arms around Peggy’s waist from behind, resting her chin on Peggy’s shoulder. You look fine, English.”

Peggy had been in front of the mirror for nearly an hour trying to get her up-do just right.“I’m not fussing over Steve.” Peggy turns around and leans against the bathroom counter without leaving Angie’s arms. “I just know I’m going to show up with the prettiest girl there, and I don’t want to look like a complete slob next to her.”

Angie’s raised a brow. “No one could ever accuse _you_ of being a slob.”

“Just let me put on my lipstick and I’ll be ready.”

They were headed to Steve’s for a New Year’s party. And if Peggy was being perfectly honest with herself, she was nervous about seeing him for the first time in over a year. And perhaps even more anxious over meeting his friends, who had undoubtedly heard plenty about her. 

At least she would have Angie by her side. She always knew how to diffuse a room with a smile. 

The past few weeks and been bliss for the new couple. Angie had tagged along for all the antics of Howard’s visit, and for Christmas, Peggy surprised her with tickets to Hamilton. 

_“How did you get these,” Angie had gasped._

_“That’s classified.”_

Angie had given her a vintage lipstick case ( _“I've never seen your lipstick out of place so I figured you gotta be reapplying it sometime.)_ Peggy grabs it from the counter now and stuffs it into her purse. 

“Alright. Let’s go.”

 

*

 

A woman with red hair and a black dress answers the door at Steve’s apartment. It takes Peggy a moment to place her — the hair is longer now, and curled — but the sharp grin on her face is one Peggy has seen smiling back at her from Steve's photos.

"You must be Peggy,” the woman says, her voice raspier than Peggy had expected. There's a slight Russian accent to her voice, probably imperceivable to anyone who hadn't spent the last year of their life tracking Russian spies. In another context, it would mean red alarms in Peggy's brain, but she's heard Steve talk about Natasha enough to relax.

Natasha opens the door wider to let them in. "Steve your girlfriend's here. And she brought her girlfriend."

In an instant, Steve has crossed the room and is hugging Peggy. 

“It’s good to see you, Peg.” 

As he pulls back, Peggy sees another figure she recognises from Steve’s photos. 

“So this is the woman I’ve heard so much about,” Bucky says extending his hand. 

Steve’s ears go pink.

Peggy accepts the hand. “I think I may have heard more about you than you about me.” 

The blush spread to Steve’s cheeks. _This could be fun,_ Peggy thinks. 

Steve turns to Angie. “And I suppose this is the woman that we didn’t know existed until a few days ago.”

“Peggy? Keeping secrets? That doesn’t sound like her,” Angie says in mock surprise. 

The party is smaller than Peggy expected. There’s Steve and Bucky, their roommate and her friend, Clint, and then there’s Sam, Steve’s new business partner. Even in the small crowd Peggy and Angie manage to sneak away for a few minutes and make good use of the mistletoe hanging in the hall.

In the kitchen, Clint is mixing drinks and vigorously debating with Bucky whether _Die Hard_ counts as a Christmas movie. Natasha is sitting on the counter sipping a martini with a smirk on her lips that suggests she could end the argument with a word but is enjoying watching it play out. 

Angie is gushing to Sam about Hamilton, and he seems interested rather than annoyed as she recounts, and on occasion acts out, all the nuances of the performance they saw. 

Peggy winds up sitting on the couch with Steve, legs tucked beneath her, knees bumping against his. Their heads lean together conspiratorially. She's not really drunk, but she's definitely not sober, and it's late enough she can let the exhaustion mix with the alcohol to produce the same effect.

“I don't miss that.”

Peggy frowns. “Miss what?”

Steve nods his head to Angie. As she turns her head, Peggy sees the streak of red on her neck beneath her ear. “Lipstick stains on everything I own,” Steve says. 

Peggy nudges him with her elbow, “Not even a little bit?”

Steve regards her fondly. “Maybe a little bit.”

“Well, I’m sure if you asked Bucky real nicely . . .”

Steve throws his head over the back of the couch in a hearty laugh.

“Man, you’ve been in New York for months, why are we just now seeing each other?”

Peggy shrugs vaguely.

“I mean I know I've been busy trying to start a nonprofit, and you've been busy protecting democracy," 

“Always so dramatic,” she says turning her eyes skyward.

"I tried, a few times, to meet up with you."

And then, maybe because of the alcohol, or maybe because she’s tired of lying to people she cares about, Peggy says. "I was afraid you didn't want to see me."

Because she almost reached out to him for when she couldn't find an apartment in Manhattan. Almost asked him for restaurant recommendations. Wanted to know if he was still into kickboxing because she could use a sparring partner. But each time she went to pick up the phone she remembered the look on his face when she told him they needed to break up. 

"Well that's bullshit,” Steve says flatly. 

Peggy snorts. 

“I’m serious. I will never not want to see you.”

"How _are_ things with the nonprofit?”

Steve runs a hand through his hair. ”Good. We've gotten a lot of sponsors."

"Like I said you would."

"Like you said I would,” he agrees. “Right now it's a lot of paperwork, tax exemptions and all that. One of my classmates, Lillian, she’s going to help us with the accounting. And now we’re looking for a place to set up shop. Did I tell you Howard was my first donor?’

“No, but I'm not surprised. I think he rather fancied you.

He laughs.

“I think you’re delusional.”

“I’m not. He told me as much one time.” 

“What about the Jarvises?” Steve asks, obviously looking for a change in subject. 

“Ana got a job at a fashion magazine in Milan, and Jarvis found a job at a resort there. The sun is suiting him horribly. Actually,” Peggy pulls out her phone to show him a photo. Edwin Jarvis in a three-piece suit, skin as red as a tomato. Steve tosses his head back in laughter again. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That’s a wrap. If you made it this far, I can’t thank you enough, especially if you’ve left comments. If you want to talk about these characters some more you can find me on Tumblr: padmedala.tumblr.com


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